In the Footsteps of Others
by Nechangi
Summary: An ancient, forgotten tablet, carrying the writing of Pandora, found in a sealed off, dusty room, leading to an abandoned cave. What could possibly go wrong? KaiShin/ShinKai. Sequel to OFAW. (Summary of OFAW inside)
1. Danger Ahead

A/N: Wow, this became soo long! I thought it would be half as long!  
I can't believe how hard it was to write the beginning! I almost began writing some Indiana Jones-stuff! Which would've made this a trilogy instead of a... of a... twology (lol).

Warnings:  
Strange English (mixing of British and American English), OOCness, KaiShin/ShinKai

Genre: Drama, Humour, Romance, Adventure  
Uploaded: 2013-04-01  
Chapter rating: K+  
Words: 3,900

* * *

**Summary of 'Of Fire And Water'  
Words: 560**  
Shinichi died protecting 1412 when he was a child and Toichi brought Pandora to him to revive him. The jewel spoke with Yuusaku and Yukiko, telling them that if Shinichi was revived he would be 'cursed'. He would be drawn to dead bodies and 'murders in progress' in order to return the energy that Pandora had given him, since the jewel would gain the energy by stealing a dying person's last breath, but unfortunately he lost all memories when he revived Shinichi. Pandora would then die with Shinichi when the detective died a second time.

With a lot of help from Vermouth and a little help from Kaitou KID, Shinichi and the FBI managed to bring the Black Organization down, and at the same time getting hold of large quantities of Aptx 4869 so that Haibara could make an antidote. The side effects of the antidote made Shinichi realise that he was in love with Kaitou KID, and in order to protect the thief he decided to take down the other organization. During his investigation he uncovered KID's identity and decided to make sure that he was in love with the thief's real identity and not just who he pretended to be.

With a dangerous plan Shinichi takes them down and then begins his tires to court the thief without anyone noticing. Kaito realises that he's in love with the Detective of the East and that he's been unconsciously flirting with him for a while and then tries to seduce him for real, but to a thief, getting together with a detective is a dangerous thing, while a detective can lose all of his credibility by being together with a thief. The danger keeps them apart, and only once one of them gets kicked in the right direction things can happen, but they still have to avoid detection by sneaky people and protect the secret of Kaitou KID together.

Pandora and Shinichi began talking to each other and realised that they could do interesting things together, like see in complete darkness or see further in a snowstorm than what's humanly possible. Pandora can take over and control Shinichi's body if he's sleeping, but that exhausts them both, and they also gets flashes of memories from Pandora's past. Kaito can for some reason (not known to you) enter Pandora's world if he touches Shinichi. This world consists of a red Tokyo, but the jewel rarely ventures further than the Kudou-mansion.

Vermouth forced Shinichi to choose between taking her life and the life of everyone he loved, together with the crowds of people at a heist. Shinichi and Pandora takes the shot and kills her, saving everyone, but it came with a prise. Long ago, in memories lost to Pandora, the jewel had given her a tear, and all that power now ended up in Shinichi, forcing Pandora to realise that once the detective died of old age the jewel would continue living; something that Pandora didn't want.

Shinichi is friends with Hakuba, who knows that Kaito is KID and who's together with Aoko. Ran is together with an OC (Isamu). Yukiko knows that Kaito is Kaitou KID, but Yuusaku doesn't know even though he would if he thought about it since he doesn't want to pry in his son's life (Toichi and Yuusaku were friends and Yuusaku knew that he was Kaitou 1412). Hattori and Kazuha are still dancing around their feelings.

* * *

**In the Footsteps of Others **

* * *

**Chap. 1  
Danger Ahead  
**

An entire year had passed since Vermouth died and vanished into thin air. It was a year that had passed a little too quickly if you asked Shinichi, but to him it had been a year of healing. He began studying at the University, not a program, just single courses that he thought could come in handy some day. Most of what he read and was planning to read was medical courses that had something to do with general poisons and emergency aid, but he'd also planned to read the basics from the Coroner's training program even though he already knew most things. After speaking with Hakuba he found himself adding some courses and ended up reading the same courses as the half-Brit that also had chosen to create his own program. The both detectives were expecting to open their own agencies in less than three years, but Kaito went in a completely different direction and began studying electrical engineering and physics.

Kaito only studied half-time and the other time worked on stage at a large restaurant during the evenings. He didn't want to draw too much attention to himself, not with the rumours that he was Kaitou KID still flying through everyone's minds from time to time, but his pride would never allow him to be 'just some magician' and he still had his father's name to uphold, so he gladly accepted the title promising and genius. He refrained himself from using too advanced tricks even though he used the simple ones with such perfection that even a few professional magicians that had known his father had watched his performance and had had a hard time realising what he'd done.

The couple was living a life filled with whatever they wanted to do, unaware that trouble was looming in the future. During a heist just before the summer Shinichi was too feverish to go to KID's heist to watch his boyfriend steal a crown, so Kaito had to amuse himself with the taskforce and ended up in an old and somewhat abandoned part of the museum. He wondered what was stored in the very back of the building, because it was certainly never used, judging by the smell of old, confined dust in the heavy air. The thief moved slowly thought the dim lighting of the moon that shone through the unclean windows. Most display cases carried a thick layer of dust over them, some empty and others not, and never before had he been so intrigued by a place; why would anyone leave the things in their cases if they was going to seal off the place? Why not take them out and sell them?

The thief was walking through the room and used one of his gloves to dust off the display cases that contained an object, but as he got to a large case at the very back of the wall where the light was worst he frowned and pulled out a napkin with his clean untainted glove to dust off the glass completely.

A black stone relic, the size of a large square plate, rested in the case and Kaito was about to move along to the next wall when he noticed a carved-in sign on the artefact and froze in place. With fascination he pulled out a flashlight and saw that he object seemed to have two beautifully carved out towers in the back corners, but was otherwise flat. However, that wasn't what interested him; it was the fact that it seemed to have lots and lots of the same signs that he'd seen in Pandora's library. Looking around the empty and dark room he then opened the protective case and took it out, surprised at how light it was even tough it seemed to consist of solid rock.

Kaito smiled and placed the crown on the relic's place and pulled up a paper.  
"_Keep the crown I found something far more interesting, so I exchanged one treasure for another. It seemed so lonely over here.  
~Kaitou KID_"  
The thief smiled and left the note underneath the crown before he closed the lid and cleaned the small sign with information.  
"Tablet of the Gods  
After being found by Hernán Cortés and the conquistadors on October 1519 in the Aztec Temple of Quetzalcoatl after the massacre of the unarmed Cholulan nobles the large tablet was brought to Spain where it remained until Napoleon Bonaparte invaded in 1808 and brought the relic to France. While Napoleon continued the French invasion of Russia 1812 the stone tablet was stolen by a worker at the museum where it was kept and brought outside of the country to China where it remained until it was bought by the Suzuki Corporation and placed here in 1969.  
In 1970 the stone tablet was dated to being over 66 million-years-old, and the material is believed to have arrived with a comet to earth since it doesn't exist on this planet, but scientists have been unable to determine when the material was used to create the tablet."

Kaito raised an eyebrow at the fact that the rare material had just been left in a dusty room and then been forgotten, but he smiled as he followed one of the signs on it; this was certainly something that would make Shinichi interested.

* * *

All the detective could do was stare as a white-clad thief placed his stolen treasure on the bed beside him, looking like a smug kitten that just presented its owner with a newly caught prey.  
"What's this?" the teenager asked in a hoarse voice, "I thought the heist-note said 'crown', and not this. Whatever it is."  
"It did," Kaito grinned and changed his clothes in seemingly an instant, making his boyfriend blink; it was something that bothered Shinichi tremendously when the thief did it without the puff of smoke, as if his brain didn't quite believe what he was seeing and therefore tried to reject that it had even happened in the first place. "But I lost the taskforce after five or ten minutes, made Hakuba run in circles and then found this really creepy room, where this thing was being held hostage, and I thought that the markings on it looked like the ones Pandora has all around him so I took it instead and left the crown."

Shinichi immediately sat up and watched his sight disappear for a moment before he could look at the tablet from above, seeing that it was the same kind of markings, and felt how Pandora wanted to have a closer look.  
'_It really is,'_ the jewel studied the letters through the detective's eyes as Shinichi reached out for it. The detective gasped as he came in contact it, watching how a red light travelled faster than he had time to react from his arms to the tablet. Shinichi dropped it quickly and then saw how the signs began to glow.  
"What did you do?" Kaito asked intrigued and jumped to the other side of the bed so that he could see the letters from the right side.  
"It drew power from Pandora," the detective confessed hoarsely and coughed, "not much, but still." Shinichi held out a finger and quickly touched one of the letters, feeling how Pandora was trying to feel if anything changed, but it didn't. He brushed his fingertips over the symbols and frowned, wondering if the old relic did something or if it was just used for some religious act of worshipping gods.

As the detective forced his tired brain to think Kaito grinned and made him gasp by hugging him from behind as he sat down and buried his nose in his neck.  
"You'll get ill," the detective remarked while the thief reached out and touched one of the letters. In shock Kaito stared as a globe formed above the board, shining in the same red light as the tablet's signs.  
"I don't know if I like this kind of magic. Whenever I've dealt with it it's never been good," the thief muttered while Shinichi stared in disbelief, trying to get his brain to accept that he was seeing real magic and not just some illusion, but then again, he had died before.  
"How often have you come across magic?" the detective wondered and reached out to carefully touch the globe on Pandora's command.  
"From time to time. It's mostly Akako from my class that's trying to put me under her spell. I think that she gave up when we got together, but she does have all the other guys in school to buy her gifts and keep her amused..." the thief answered, hoping that the detective wouldn't get hurt by touching it.

Shinichi hummed as his fingers passed though the red globe and saw that it reacted with his movements.  
_'There,'_ Pandora's voice whispered in his mind and he stopped spinning the globe.  
'Where?' the jewel's host thought.  
_'Bottom left of USA,'_ Shinichi turned the globe and stared at where the jewel was hinting, _'if you look closely you can see that he lines are all extending from that one point.'_  
"Pandora, what lines?" Shinichi asked loudly, knowing that Kaito enjoyed guessing the conversations that the jewel and his host had.  
_'Wait, you can't see them, can you?'_  
"No, I can't see them. It just looks like a red earth to me,"  
_'Let me try something,'_ Pandora said and Shinichi blinked, seeing that the globe seemed to come to life. It sparkled with energy and the power ran everywhere in the form of lines, all conveying in one spot.  
"I can see it now," the detective stated and touched it.

As soon as the globe was touched in the right spot it seemed to zoom in on it, until it showed a familiar picture; one of the world's most known places.  
"I know that place," Kaito exclaimed as they seemed to fly over a landscape of red rocks and steep cliffs, carrying a stream of water at the bottom.  
"Grand Canyon," Shinichi agreed, "my parents took me there once when I was small."  
"I've always wanted to go there with my glider, soaring along the cliffs," the thief grinned and watched how the picture slowed down, turned and entered a cave. Passing through the back wall they suddenly entered a new one, but this one was consisting of what appeared to be black rock with shining blue crystals along the wall. Small droplets of water were being captured by what appeared to be hand-carved, bowl-shaped rocks sticking out from the wall. All over the walls the same signs that Pandora had in the books in his library were glowing in red, giving the room a somewhat eerie feeling.  
_'I want to go there,'_ the jewel suddenly exclaimed excitedly in his host's head, _'can we go there?'_  
"Pandora wants to go there," Shinichi informed his boyfriend and continued to watch the strange room.  
"I guess that we're taking a rather interesting summer vacation," the thief grinned happily and hugged his ill boyfriend, knowing that they would have to map out what the relic was showing them and then return it.

* * *

Hakuba gave him a questioning look as he watched the Detective of the East pack his bags, trying to mentally scratch away the fact that he was fairly certain that he could see a KID-outfit in his friend's bag.  
"So are you two stopping anywhere on the way to America?" the blonde asked, knowing that Shinichi would understand that he was asking if they were going stealing.  
"Rome and Paris," Shinichi smiled at his troubled friend, "don't worry about us; we'll be fine."  
"What if you two gets stopped in the airport security?"  
"Don't worry; we've got everything planned out," the dark-haired teenager stated, but didn't miss the other's doubtful look.  
"I sure hope that you know what you're doing becoming KID's assistant," the half-Brit remarked and shook his head, "I never thought I would see such a good detective turn corrupt."  
"Oi! Hakuba, you're just as corrupt as me!" Shinichi sent the detective an amused glare.  
"And don't I know it..." Hakuba complained in a mutter, "when will you two get back?"  
"I'm not exactly sure, but between three and five weeks if everything goes according to plan. We're going to stop by my parents and then head over to Grand Canyon, so we might have to run away from them in order to continue alone."

* * *

After getting away from the rest of the tourists Kaito and Shinichi headed off in their own direction. Disregarding the guide's warning about it being a dangerous area they wandered through the heat until sundown and then set up camp, knowing that they would have to travel two more days to reach the cave, counting in the fact that they would be using the gliders the next day, just before the sunrise. During the entire time Pandora was eager to see the cave, wondering if he would remember something new; maybe he could find a way for him to die together with Shinichi and Kaito when the time came?

It wasn't until a few days later when they used the binocular-function on the monocles that they found the entrance to the cave on the other side of a large ravine not far from them.  
"Judging by the distance we should be able to fly there if we make a circle," Kaito smiled and then looked at the way they would be forced to climb if they explored the cave and found no other way out, "but the way up won't be fun."  
"No," Shinichi agreed as he watched the wall, trying to find the easiest way up, "how long is the modified grappling-hook?"  
"Not long enough, and I won't use it on that wall; it will just tear loose rocks. It might be easier to just go down to the river and walk beside it until we find a better way up."  
"Yea, I suggest that we stay in the outer cave for the night and then begin our descent early in the morning. We could rest by the water and at the same time filter some so that we have for the way back," Shinichi continued and saw his boyfriend nod.

Kaito used the monocle to look around, seeing only deserted rock, before he smiled and saw Shinichi close his eyes. The detective didn't particularly enjoy the fact that he wasn't able to change into the KID-outfit on his own; Shinichi took at least a few minutes, and that was minutes that he had to endure and ignore his boyfriend's perverted smirk, remarks and so obviously content hums. The teenagers placed their packing on their front and closed the straps, making sure that the mantle was flying freely behind them.

The thief ran to the edge, extending the glider as he took the last steps and almost lifted off the ground before he got to the ravine. Shinichi watched him for a moment and then followed suit, watching the thief soar in a large circle before him. Kaito folded his wing, easily landing by the entrance and took off the bag so that he could help his boyfriend if he needed it. Shinichi landed without the same elegance that the thief had had and would've fallen backwards if it wasn't for the fact that Kaito grabbed into the bag and pulled him inside.

'_I can feel something,'_ Pandora informed Shinichi as the two teenagers made their way deeper inside, still enlightened by the sun that shone through deep cracks in the ceiling, _'not far from here.'_  
'How about you work with me?' Shinichi thought and stopped, 'maybe you can see something that I can't, just like with the globe.' After getting an agreeing response from the jewel Shinichi closed his eyes and mentally reached for Pandora, suddenly able to see a world consisting of red and slightly glowing lines. The detective opened his eyes and continued walking, seeing pulses of something moving though his field of vision.

"Can you see anything?" Kaito wondered and smiled as the detective's now red eyes turned to him.  
"There's something further in; it's like energy pulses running through the walls," the detective informed his boyfriend, seeing that the thief had turned on his flashlight, and he realised that it must be dark, "how are you doing? Is it dark?"  
"Yes, I'm fine, I have the monocle and the torch," Kaito smiled, "but tell me if there's monsters."  
"Don't scare Pandora," Shinichi rolled his eyes, unable to comprehend why the jewel would even tell Kaito that he was afraid of the dark, "you know that he's scared for me and you, and not himself. He would survive, even if you and I were torn to shreds."  
"Yea-yea, but we'll be fine,"  
"And he'll get back at you," the detective smiled in a way that ne never usually did, so Kaito knew that it wasn't his boyfriend talking anymore, "twice over."  
"Bring it, Pandora," the thief grinned hearing the detective mutter something as he got the control back .

Turning around a corner Shinichi saw how the red lines conveyed around a small circular shape beside a larger square one.  
"That looks disturbingly much like a door," the detective continued walking and stopped in front of it.  
"I can't see anything, to me it looks like any ordinary stone wall," Kaito stated as he shone the light over it and placed his hand on it, however, to Shinichi something interesting happened; the lines bent in Kaito's direction and then retook their normal paths as the thief stopped touching the stone.  
"I think there's a button here," Shinichi placed his hand on it and then watched how the lined changed and formed a room behind the wall, but the wall still seemed to be straight in front of them, "that's odd. Touch the wall again, Kaito." When the thief did as he was told he gasped inaudibly as his hand went straight through it. Slowly he took a step closer, watching his entire arm disappear and then pulled it out of seemingly solid rock.  
"Well, that's fascinating," he pointed out and then saw how his boyfriend stepped inside before he quickly followed.

The room was exactly what they'd seen weeks before and they looked around in awe.  
"Say what you will about witches, but they sure knows how to decorate," Kaito smirked and then saw that there was a similar relic to the one he'd found at the museum sitting on a pedestal, surrounded by what appeared to be glowing blue water.  
"This is home," a voice whispered and Kaito saw that the detective was looking around the room, "at least that's what Pandora feels it to be."  
"Maybe they created him here," the magician found himself answering and then carefully walked up to the second relic, realising that it was about two decimetres long, one decimetre wide and about two centimetres thick. Two circles were carved beside each other, one was slightly smaller. The relic also lacked the towers that the bigger one had had, but it was rounder and seemed to have been made to hold in one's hand. The size of the pedestal it was sitting on made Kaito suspicious of the fact that it might even have been made to hold both of the relics together; the larger one behind the smaller one.  
"Shinichi, have a look at this," Kaito said as he turned around, seeing that the detective was standing with his eyes closed. Ehe thief frowned and waited, wondering what the two were talking about.

* * *

As Kaito passed in the corner of Shinichi's field of vision, an old memory passed before him, but it was blurry and not sounding entirely right, so he closed his eyes and concentrated on it. Someone had walked up to the pedestal and placed down the large relic and then placed the smaller one in front of it. For some reason it felt as if Pandora had failed at something, and the blurry person seemed to feel that too as he shook his head and said something while he turned around; Shinichi could see the mouth move, but he couldn't hear anything, but the man's eyes were sad.  
_"So this is it? This is where we'll remain?"_ Pandora's host had wondered all those years ago and sighed, _"then so be it."_  
The world flashed a bit and Shinichi saw in the memory how the man had walked past them.  
_"You can't just leave it like that! That if it falls into the wrong hands?"_ the host had almost yelled and the detective suddenly realised that there were more unclear people in the room with him, most standing by the door.  
_'No one can use it; it's dead, so what's the point in setting up traps?'_ the jewel had asked a bit shamefully while the rest of the people had just ignored him.  
_"It's not your fault Pandora, nothing is your fault. This is home now."_

Shinichi opened his eyes, finding that he was looking straight into two worried, indigo orbs.  
"Are you okay, Shinichi? You're crying," the thief dried away a tear with his thumb and saw that his boyfriend looked genuinely surprised.  
"I'm crying?"  
"Is Pandora sad?"  
"No," Shinichi frowned, "it must've been one of the previous hosts. These memories are very confusing and it makes me feel insane. I would honestly class myself as a schizophrenic if it wasn't for the fact that you and my parents are so sure that I'm not. Whatever is on that plinth it's useless and unprotected."  
"Are you sure?"  
"Yea, they placed it here because it was 'dead', as they put it," Shinichi informed and walked up to the relic with his boyfriend.  
"So it's safe to touch?" Kaito wondered as he reached out and allowed his hand to hover above it.  
"Yes," the detective confirmed and watched how the embodied curiosity picked it up, "when it had power it was dangerous in the wrong hands, but now it's harmless." Shinichi held out his hand to so that the thief would hand it to him so that he could have a closer look at it, but as Kaito placed it in his hand and he grabbed it his eyes widened as pain shot through his body. Kaito frowned at his hand as he was unable to let it go while Shinichi opened his mouth, not knowing if he was trying to breathe or scream in pain, but he was unable to do anything as his body was frozen in place.

Everything happened in less than a second, but Shinichi's arm glowed in red as so much power was drawn from Pandora that he could feel his heart burn in pain. Kaito, that saw the glow, immediately focused on his boyfriend only to see that his teeth were gritted and his eyes closed hard, showing a face of pure agony. Kaito grabbed into the detective's fingers and tried to get a grip to tear them off, breaking them if he had to, but something made him unable to do anything else but slightly touch them, and as it didn't work he resorted into trying to tear the thing away from his detective, but nothing worked, no matter if he yanked with his entire body.

Red lines encapsulated them and Kaito ran out of ideas as he had nothing more he could do but hold Shinichi close, hoping that it would be okay, that the detective wasn't going to die because of some foolish memory and Kaito's stupid decision that touching magical objects was somehow okay.


	2. Dust to Dust

A/N: Until I come up with anything better as a cover picture I'll just use the one with text. Oh, and on a side note; I've been waiting for this moment... *evil grin*

Brace yourselves:  
Author uses Moffat-mode

Warnings:  
Strange English, OOCness

Uploaded: 2013-04-06  
Chapter rating: K+  
Words: 2,900

* * *

**Chap. 2  
Dust to Dust**

Kaito watched the red energy while caressing his rigid boyfriend, holding him close and whispering words of love and fear, suddenly feeling the detective grow limb in his arms.  
"Shinichi?" he whispered in panic and relaxed a bit as he felt the other's gasps for air. He became able to release the relic from his grip and heard it drop to the ground while their prison dissolved around them. He was able to see a dark forest around them before he unstrapped the detective from his bag and let it fall to the ground.  
"Kai," the whisper that reached his ears was very weak and Kaito hushed him.  
"You're alive, Shinichi. We'll be fine. We'll be fine," Kaito stated and pulled up the limp detective in his arms as he sat down in the grass and began to pet him, "we just moved a bit. Teleported; it's not the first time I've done that. I can hear cars. We got to be in the far end of a forest. I think I can see the streetlights. Probably late evening or early in the night."  
"Kai, breathe," Shinichi whispered weakly, feeling how his body became heavier and heavier, and he knew that he wouldn't stay conscious for long, "hospital."  
"Yes, of course," Kaito exclaimed and pulled off his own backpack before he threw the relic with the help of a stick and their packing into a denser part of a bushed area and then scoped the detective up.  
"Love you," Shinichi whispered and Kaito shook his head as he quickly made his way towards the noises of cars.  
"I love you too, Nichi, my sun, but don't say it in this kind of situation. It's bad luck," the thief begged and got to a low, black, metal fence decorated with roses. He easily jumped over it and landed on the pavement as he pulled his mobile from the air, seeing that he had no signal, but as the detective gasped in pain and clutched his heart he called out to his boyfriend, gaining the attention of the few people on the street.

* * *

Shinichi entered Pandora's world, seeing that the library had dissolved with the entire world, and only Pandora was sitting on a patch of red floor, holding his arms around his legs, surrounded by nothing but darkness and the little piece of floor. The detective stared at the red copy of himself and then realised that the ground around the jewel was slowly vanishing.  
"Pandora!" Shinichi called out as he stood in the darkness and saw how the gem looked up with confusion in his eyes.

"Who are you?" Pandora wondered slowly, seemingly tired, and threw a glance to the floor, pulling away his leg from the edge, "don't touch the dark; it hurts." Shinichi opened his mouth to say something as the jewel stood up and stared at him, realising that the other person was standing in the darkness. "If the darkness doesn't hurt you, you should run," Pandora smiled a bit confused as he watched the floor vanish underneath his feet, causing him to stand in the darkness.

"Who are you?" the jewel wondered once he looked up again and saw that he wasn't alone, and Shinichi saw to his horror how the one he had shared his mind with was slowly fading away, "do I know you? Do you know who I am?"  
"You're Pandora," the detective walked up to the gem, and pulled him into a hug, "you're a good person. You're my friend. Please, stay with me." Shinichi felt a few pats on his back and then felt how his arms fell to his chest as the last shreds of power died away. "I said please..." the detective whispered into the nothingness as he fell to his knees, still hugging his chest, "why don't you ever listen?"

* * *

"I'll get an ambulance," someone suddenly stated beside him as the man called on his mobile and Kaito looked up in shock; he had not expected anyone to be able to speak Japanese, but he had no idea where he was. The thief registered the name of the street they were in and was then asked what was wrong with his twin, but as the ambulance seemed to arrive just after the call Kaito realised that he was having a panic attack since he was unable to tell time correctly. He wasn't even aware if he'd been answering any questions or just trying to take care of Shinichi.

He hastily thanked the man that had called and then jumped into the vehicle after the ambulance staff, seeing that the woman closed the door while the man examined the shallow-breathing detective, and Kaito didn't even realise that the man was talking to him until his arm was grabbed.  
"Hey, kid, what's your name?" the paramedic asked and Kaito blinked as he focused on the concerned eyes.  
"I'm fine. I mean, Kuroba Kaito," the thief answered and felt the entire world come crashing back; finally he had his brain in full control, "where am I?"  
"Tokyo," the man stated a bit concerned and smiled a bit strained, knowing that panicky family members easily could get confused.  
"I see," Kaito said as he sent a glance out the small windows on the doors; the world outside the car was certainly not the Tokyo he knew. It looked more like London, with its older houses in stone and brick, instead of the metal, glass-encased skyscrapers that he was used to, "Shinichi and I were travelling. I don't know what happened, but he suddenly became very weak and felt a lot of pain." The teenager studied his boyfriend that was seemingly sleeping. Kaito's brain suddenly sent an alarm throughout his entire body, but before he even had time to realise what was wrong the woman had began to bark orders to the man that immediately began administrating CPR while she collected the pads from the wall and placed gel on them.

The thief made himself as small as he could in the corner as he watched the woman yell, "clear." before she chocked the detective's chest, and for every increase in power and every shake the man made with his head as he checked the pulse Kaito died a little on the inside. Both of the paramedics seemed to become more reluctant to give up as time passed but then Shinichi finally took a breath on his own and came back to life, seemingly sleeping again.  
"Dead for 2 minutes and 19 seconds," the woman reported to herself and took the teenager's pulse, unaware that those moments had been the longest in Kaito's life, "he's stabilising."  
"Don't worry, kid," the man stated and looked to the boy that he thought was the twin-brother, "he'll be fine."

Kaito followed Shinichi out of the ambulance and through corridors, until a nurse placed her hand on his chest and stopped him outside an examination room.  
"You have to wait here," she stated in a kind voice and the thief nodded as she walked with him to a waiting room only a few metres away. "Is there anything you need? Something to drink?" the nurse wondered while observing a pale, young man that was starring out through the window.

"He'll be fine; I know he will. He has to be," Kaito stated as he observed the city that they called Tokyo, but there were only European buildings and no Tokyo tower. There were barely any neon signs and no building seemed to be higher than 25 floors. He took a sip of the mug of water that was in his hand, only to wonder where it had come from, but he quickly decided that it was a useless piece of information. He looked around himself and found that he was alone, except the nurse from before that was observing him.  
"How long have I been here?" he wondered and saw how she looked up to the clock that hung on the wall.  
"About 15 minutes," she responded and Kaito shook his head, having felt like only a minute had passed, "it's very common for time to either move very slowly or very fast. Just remember to breathe."  
"Yea, Shinichi told me to do that," Kaito smiled sadly, "what's your name?"  
"Chiyo, and yours is?" the nurse continued.  
"Kaito, Kuroba Kaito. Did you hear anything about Shinichi while I was spacing out, Chiyo-san?"  
"No, they are still performing tests on him. We could call your parents if you gave us their number..." Chiyo tried and Kaito smiled sadly, knowing that if this was Tokyo, then their parents didn't exist.  
"I'm afraid that even if you called them they wouldn't pick up. The world they live in is so much more different than this," the magician said as he turned around, realising that lying and creating a fake identity would be the best way to go, "we only have each other right now."  
"I'm sorry for your loss," she said and for a long while the thief remained quiet, trying to think up new identities, and find a way to ''kill'' their parents.

A doctor showed up from the corridor after a painfully long time had passed and Kaito spun around, seeing the man look at a medical chart.  
"Is it about Shinichi?" the thief wondered and the doctor looked up from his paper.  
"Kuroba Shinichi, yes. And you must be the brother, Kaito," the man stated and received a nod, "he's stable, but we haven't found an explanation for what happened. He seems to have sustained a lot of bullet wounds in the past, but the x-rays showed no lasting damage. He's currently in a coma, but we'll continue to see if we can find the cause. We'll know more in a day or two when we get the results, but for now we'll keep him in intensive care. You can be with him now." Kaito threw a glance to the clock on the wall, seeing that he must've been standing by the window for an hour.

"Take me to him," the thief demanded and followed the doctor as they walked through a corridor and then ended up in an open room with a large desk where nurses sat beside their computers, looking though papers. Vending machines with sandwiches and different kind of drinks were standing by one wall. Someone was sitting in a chair sleeping outside a room with an open door, and Kaito could hear the beeping of the machines as they passed the rooms.  
"Kuroba-sama has room 20," the doctor stated as he stopped outside a room and Kaito walked inside, feeling his heart grow heavy as he saw Shinichi once again connected to medical devices.  
"Thank you, doctor," the thief said as he turned around and sat down in the chair beside his boyfriend, remembering how he'd been sitting in a chair beside Shinichi only a year ago, waiting for him to wake up.  
"Please, stay with me..." Kaito whispered and took the detective's hand in his.

* * *

An innocent-looking teenage boy gasped as he sat up wide-eyed in his bed and panted. Something was wrong; he could feel it gnawing in his body. The fifteen-year-old, spiky-haired redhead jumped down from the top bed of a bunk bed and heard the conscious he carried within him snore loudly, but since he'd long ago gotten used to the other he didn't care. As he opened the large window that led to the balcony he heard a small sound coming from his pet and he stared at the small rabbit-like creature that was staring at him from the place on his pillow.  
"Stay," the teenager whispered, not wanting to wake the other and saw how the little white creature yawned before it curled itself together into a ball to go back to sleep. With a thankful sigh he climbed out to the balcony and went up to the roof.  
_'Go back to bed,'_ a voice inside his head complained as soon as the other woke up and he looked out over the city, trying to pinpoint where the strange feeling came from.  
'Don't you feel that?' the teenager thought and heard the other yawn.  
_'Yes, grandpa will probably send us out for it tomorrow, so let's just go to bed.'_  
'No,' the main owner of the body settled and climbed into the room again, hearing the other sigh.  
_'I want to sleep, and I'm going to sleep. Don't come complaining to me in the morning when you're tired.'_  
The teenager didn't bother answering since he heard the other fall asleep while he got dressed in a pair of comfortable, dark pants and a red T-shirt, matching the colour of his hair, before he made his way downstairs and silently snuck out of the house.

The redhead panted slightly as he jumped off the bicycle beside the park, frustrated since he'd lost track of the presence had come from somewhere. For a while he just leaned on the black, metal fence and rested, seeing a few cars and people pass by in the still night. With a sigh he gave up for the moment and jumped back on the bicycle to go home.

* * *

Kaito gasped as he woke up, feeling his neck radiate with pain as he sat up in the chair and he groaned quietly as he massaged it with the hand that he wasn't using to hold into the detective's. Even though he'd slept he felt exhausted, and as little as he wanted to leave Shinichi's side he had to take care of the fake identities, which meant exploring the town and checking to see if the technology was exactly the same.  
'Maybe it's older,' Kaito thought hopefully as he walked out of the room with a last long look at his 'brother'; he sure needed something positive right now.  
"Kuroba-sama?" a voice asked beside him and he saw the young nurse that had spoken with him for a bit the night before.  
"Chiyo-san, please, call me Kaito," the thief forced his poker face to a smile.  
"Okay, Kaito-sama, I was just going to see how you're doing," Chiyo said in a kind voice.  
"I'm doing okay; it's not the first time Shinichi's been in the hospital, and I'm certain that he'll be fine," the magician stated with conviction and made the woman smile sadly; she'd seen the kind of faith in lots of relatives to patients, "I'll go for a walk now."  
"This time?" she wondered and made the thief throw a glance to a clock on the wall, seeing that it was only five in the morning.  
"Yes, I have to move a bit, but I'll be back. Are there any kind of lock on the doors?"  
"Yes, they'll be open at seven,"  
"Then I'll be back after seven," the thief smiled and took a few steps before he realised that he had a problem. "Um," he said as he turned around, "where's the exit?"  
"I'll show you," Chiyo stated and lead him to the doors.

* * *

After walking aimlessly through the city, and from time to time going up on a roof to look at the surroundings, he found himself digging though their packing to make breakfast. Kaito glared at the small relic that was lying in the grass, gleaming darkly in the light from the sun that made its way through the foliage of the trees. Carefully, he wrapped it in a shirt, using a pair of sticks and tied the arms together so that he wouldn't touch it. He placed it in the bottom of the backpack, hoping that they would be able to find a witch somewhere that they didn't have to sell their souls to in order to gain help. In silence he ate his rice and dried meat while making a list of what he had to do before going back to the hospital.

Firstly, he had to check the library and find out about the history of the country and Tokyo, so that he could make up believable pasts for their parents and themselves. Shinichi would want to be a detective, so he had to make up some kind of story for his bullet wounds, and as for himself he didn't really care, as long as Shinichi stayed with him.  
Secondly, he had to find out what kind of security systems the police station had in place, but judging by the average technology in the city he didn't have to worry that much; it seemed to be on pair with the Tokyo he was from or older. The buildings and cars were older models, the same went with the mobiles and he hadn't seen one single phone with a touch screen, like his, so he had to hide it, not that it was of any use to him now that he couldn't get a signal.  
Thirdly, he needed to find a way to survive, preferably one that didn't force him to take up less desirable traits for his criminal life. He needed to find a job in order to get money and food. He needed a place to sleep and clean himself, but since he had both of their backpacks he had food for at least another week, or at best two, if he rationed it correctly. He could sleep in the park in his sleeping bag, and since the city was lying beside the ocean he could wash up there. During rainy nights he could stay at the hospital, but he doubted that they would allow him to sleep there constantly.

* * *

A/N: So by coincidence I found out that Nichi is the Kanji for the sun, meaning day. So that's fun!

* * *

**Answer to guest review; Great**  
Yea, I nearly ended up doing that XD


	3. Angel of Darkness

A/N: I had a great deal of troubles deciding what Kaito was going to call himself, but well, this will do ;)

Warnings:  
Strange English, OOCness

Uploaded: 2013-04-17  
Chapter rating: K+  
Words: 3,100

* * *

**Chap. 3  
Angel of Darkness**

Kaito quickly found a library, beautifully built beside a canal, and he decided that the city might look a bit more like Rome or Venice than London, especially with the gondolas floating through some of the waterways. He also loved the fact that the city was build beside a cliff and that the houses just continued down it; it truly was a sight to be seen, especially when the sun began to set and bathed the city in red and orange. He couldn't wait to show Shinichi and he would have to take a picture or something.

The reason for the differences in this Tokyo was that they in this world apparently had had an open relation to Europe compared to the Japan in his own world and had thereby been inspired by the architecture, but the city that they called Tokyo wasn't on the same place as in his own world, and Osaka was the capitol. The computer security was very similar to the one he was used to so creating the identities only took a little bit of time, and then putting them into the system took even less effort, but despite that he didn't return to the hospital until ten.

Sitting beside his boyfriend Kaito waited for him to wake up even though the doctors kept telling him that he was in a coma. Days passed in a blur of outdoor walks, staring at his boyfriend and a growling stomach, and Kaito suddenly found himself low on food. He berated himself for allowing it to happen as he walked along the streets a clear evening, watching the sky turn red. As he wandered he passed a small restaurant where he stopped, seeing that it was only going to be open for another hour and that it was almost empty, but what interested him was the 'help wanted'-sign that stood in the window.

"Good evening," Kaito smiled to the white-haired, kind-looking lady behind the counter, "I just saw that you wanted help."  
"Yes," the elderly lady smiled, "I'll get Hotaka. You just wait here." Kaito looked after her as she vanished into the back of the restaurant and saw how the only two guests that had been eating ice-cream was holding into each other's hand while they spoke. Kaito felt a sting of sadness as the couple smiled warmly and held eye-contact, but he quickly pushed it away as the woman came back with a large, well-trained man in his mid-thirties, looking more like a surfer than a restaurant owner.  
"Hey there, kid," the sunburnt man with short brown hair and kind, green eyes greeted as he shook Kaito's hand firmly, "I'm Sasaki Hotaka, owner of this restaurant. Why don't we have a seat?" Hotaka made a gesture to the table furthest away from the two guests, and Kaito followed him there.

"We need someone to work extra from around four to ten during Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. You'll be serving tables, cleaning and anything I don't have time to do during rush-hours. Now, I do have a few interested already, so why would I choose you?" Hotaka wondered and observed the teenager before him.  
"I used to work in a restaurant, not as a waiter, but as a magician for dinner and late night entertainment. Saying that 'I'm pretty good' is an understatement and will offer my services as an entertainer if you want, but you should know that things have really gone wrong this year," Kaito informed with a slightly pained smile, deciding to try to get the job with the help of the man's compassion, "I'll pretty much do anything for food right now. Ever since my parents died in a car crash last year my brother and I have been travelling to find a new place to call home, but things recently took a turn for the worse as Shinichi fell in a coma. I'm just trying to find a job so that I can be close to him, since he's the only family I got right now." Kaito saw that the man seemed hesitant to ask any more questions so the magician simply continued. "I don't want much money, and I can less than whatever you're offering. Now, why would you choose me? I obviously have a lot of problems at the moment," Kaito shrugged and then gave the man a hard gaze, keeping it as he continued, "I will do everything in my power to keep this job. I will entertain if you want me too. Do dishes. Clean. Anything and everything. I need money to survive and for when my brother gets well..." The thief stopped speaking and observed the man, wondering if he'd have to continue.

"You do seem to be very dedicated," Hotaka said slowly, touched by the sincerity and desperation that seemed to radiate off of the teenager before him. The man let his eyes scan the boy, seeing that he had charisma, and he seemed like he could be very charming if he wanted to, "but I won't hire you just yet. I need to see how you are with the customers, but of the interested you're the one with experience and seem to have a lot of honesty, something that I value highly. Why don't you come by tomorrow around seven for the morning-hours; there's less people then compared to the lunch-hours. Can you make it?"  
"Yes, I'll be there," Kaito nodded and followed the man as he stood up.  
"After I've seen how you work we'll discuss your pay and you can show me what you can do as a magician," Hotaka smiled at the teenager as Kaito nodded again, "see you in the morning."

* * *

Kaito sat on his knees on the floor beside the detective's bed, smiling gently as he rested his cheek on his folded arms and told him about his day, hoping that Shinichi and Pandora could hear him; maybe they were just locked into their own world. That night he stayed at the hospital, washing up in the restroom so that he would be presentable and stole a dried-out sandwich from the counter in the nurses' kitchen; he'd seen it the night before, so he didn't think that anyone would eat it.

* * *

The thief kept a smile on his lips as he conversed with the early customers, taking their order and bringing it to them without fault. As the clock struck nine Hotaka pulled him inside the kitchen where he was introduced properly to the old lady, Sasaki Kotone that was his mother, and to his wife, Naoki, who worked as a chef. Both of the women were filled with joy and loved the restaurant, and Kaito got to hear a few stories about the couple's children; twins, one boy and one girl. He was given a meal and after he'd eaten he performed a small magic-show, earning laughs and happy smiles from the audience.  
"Here, it's for today," Hotaka smiled and handed him a pay check after he signed the contract that he would be working during the weekends, "you said you needed money. I'll give you your check every Sunday instead of every month, so see you in two days."  
"Thank you," Kaito stated as he took the paper, seeing that it said more than what he'd demanded, but he accepted it with a grateful 'thank you'.

The teenager smiled a bit as he made it towards the hospital; he couldn't wait to tell Shinichi about what had happened that day. As Kaito sat by the bed, exchanging ideas with the non-answering-detective about what kind of food he should buy with the money for it to last as long as possible, his heart twisted in pain as he used the detective's voice to answer his own questions so silently that it only came out as a whisper, and not before long he'd fallen asleep on the floor beside his lover. When Chiyo came on the night shift she found the exhausted boy and smiled sadly before she brought a blanket and a pillow to him and tucked him in.

* * *

"Did you hear it?" a female voice came through the doorway and Kaito woke up early in the morning, staring around himself as he sat up, confused by the blanket.  
"Hear what?" Chiyo's voice answered and Kaito saw the nurses pass the doorway as he stretched, feeling nauseously tired, but he hadn't slept well for the last two and a half weeks.  
"Kaitou Dark will strike at seven," the woman stated and Kaito froze in his position, "I'm going there to see him fly in! Can you even imagine how it would be to have wings? Ah, I'd do anythi..." The thief listened to their dying voices until his strained ears heard nothing more, but all he could to was stare into the wall; a phantom thief with wings.  
'Wings,' his tired mind whispered as he went out to the coffee makers, 'Wings... Magic...' Kaito took two cups of coffee and sat down in a small couch as he turned on the TV, suddenly realising why his boyfriend only recently stopped drinking such ridiculous amounts of coffee; Kaito forced Shinichi to go to bed earlier than usual, so he was more rested and therefore stopped drinking unnecessary cups of coffee and only drank because he liked the taste. With a sigh he blew a bit on one cup before he burnt his lip and decided to wait a moment longer.

Changing channels, he suddenly found a news reporter that had a notice written in the top right corner.  
"_At 19:00 tonight, I will steal The Whisperer of Peace, from the Victorian museum.  
~Kaitou Dark_"  
Kaito stared empty-eyed at the screen as they showed the face of a young man with purple hair, long bangs in the front and shorter hair in his neck, smiling confidently as he flew on black wings; wings that looked very real, but they could still be some kind of prop. Dark might be held by a balloon like KID sometimes was. The magician was suddenly struck by how utterly boring and unimaginative the heist note was and scowled a bit as he blew on the coffee, carefully dipping his lip into the hot liquid to feel if it had gotten cold enough to not scold his mouth, and as he didn't burn himself he downed it all in one sweep before he picked up the next cup and drank it the same way. After waiting for a while he watched how his hands began to tremble as the caffeine took effect; he really hated it, the caffeine, or rather, his body rebelled when he was only running on the drug. Kaito knew that he needed food and rest, but that he could get after he'd seen if this Dark had magical abilities and maybe could help Shinichi.

He left early that morning, as usual, and got some food before he went to his packing that he was still hiding in the park. The KID-outfit was a bit looser on his body than normally, but after he'd gotten the gadgets and a few neutral masks he decided to take a look at the officers that were known for trying to stop this world's most elusive phantom thief.

The police inspector Saehara, who was leading on the Kaitou Dark-cases, was a fierce-looking man with brown hair and bushy eyebrows, and Kaito couldn't help but to think that he looked a little bit like a wolf. Despite his wild appearance he was a kind man with a large heart that cared for the people in the town. The thief found out that the man was most often head of the investigations, as long as the blue-haired Commander Hiwatari didn't show up, and apparently the youngster with glasses, only fifteen-years-old, had graduated from university at the age of thirteen and was the one that was closest to even catching Dark. From what Kaito discovered, Hiwatari was on Shinichi's level or just below, but as the teenager had gone travelling to America he was no threat, even though Kaito made sure to prepare for him; what if he had that same kind of nasty habit of just showing up whenever he pleased, like Hakuba?

As the thief walked into the museum disguised as a police officer two hours before Dark was going to strike he had only the intention of questioning the thief, but just like himself Dark liked to be mysterious so he doubted that he'd get any real answers unless he did something unexpected. Kaito was sent to the room with the object and observed it quietly. The Whispererof Peace had the shape of a dove and was carved from marble with blue emeralds as eyes and a twig in its beak. Kaito smiled at it; it was truly a piece of art, unbelievably beautiful from the feathers to the eyes, and it made him realise how much he missed his own doves. Never before had he been without them. He'd grown up with his father's doves and had been taught how to take care of them and train them. Kaito could still remember his first dove, Aika, and she would always have a special place in his heart.

The thief's eyes was moving over the information about the piece as he thought, suddenly realising that he couldn't just steal feathers from Dark's wings to see if they were fake or not; he had to steal the dove too, because The Whispererof Peace had been given to Japan after a war with South Korea a very long time ago, and it was said that the dove helped heal the injured. As little as he wanted to bring possible magical objects near Shinichi, he still wished for him to be well, and this one had a kind expression on it. Kaito listened to two talking officers as he continued reading about how the war had been a shame to both of the countries as it had begun in a misunderstanding, but after the war when peace settled the countries had grown closer to each other, and nowadays had almost completely open borders.

Mentally nodding to himself Kaito decided that if he could show Dark that he had a worthy challenger he would be more interested in talking, and Kaito already had the 'Pluck the Phantom Thief'-trap in place, so if he simply activated that and distracted the other he would be in business, but as Kaito thought more and more about his plan he began to grow pensive; he simply needed a last, personal touch. As the time neared and there were only fifteen minutes left, he came up with the perfect solution, knowing that Dark most often used a small case to transport his loot in. With a small, soundless chuckle Kaito disappeared into the darkness; Dark would never know what hit him.

* * *

Kaito breathed calmly as he hung in the ceiling with the help of ropes, using mirrors to stay hidden and looked down on the police officers that were guarding the dove. The time came and Kaito heard in his headset that Dark had been spotted outside the museum. His hands trembled a bit from the caffeine and he cursed the free coffee they gave away at the hospital as he held in the grappling hook and the remote to the trap. Smoke exploded around the policemen and Kaito placed the gasmask over his face, watching closely as he saw Dark open a window and jump inside.

"Still never learn," the phantom thief with purple hair shook his head as he walked past the sleeping men and then opened his black case, intensely observed by the magician in the ceiling. Kaito prepared himself as Dark placed the dove in his attaché, but as he smirked and walked back towards the window Kaito pushed the button, causing tense lines to release from the roof and smack into the ground. The purple-haired thief called out in both shock and pain as one of the lines had stuck the end of his wing and made feathers fall to the ground.  
"What kind of messed up trap is that?" Dark roared to the sleeping officers and then examined the damage caused to his wing, not noticing how the case that he'd dropped was lifted into the air with a hook, emptied and then returned to the floor. Kaito smiled at the fact that his first simple plan had worked as he placed the dove in a hidden bag that hung from the ceiling and then climbed along the beam to the wall, seeing how the thief flew up to the high window.

"So you're the one they call Dark?" Kaito asked as he stood in the darkness, knowing that the only thing the other thief would be able to see was his silhouette and the gleaming from the monocle.  
"Yes," the purple-haired teenager, seemingly around nineteen to twenty years of age, said and stared at him as he turned around, "who do I have the pleasure to meet?"  
"Just a humble gentleman thief, with lots of questions," the white-clad thief stated.  
"A gentleman thief? Did you make that up yourself?" Dark questioned with a smile as the held into the edges of the window and leaned with his back out of it, "if you came here to challenge me you've already lost!"  
"Have a good evening, Kaitou-san," Kaito grinned, knowing that he'd won in more than one aspect, "I figured that you wouldn't want to answer questions right away, so see you next time." Dark just smirked and jumped out of the window, unaware that he hadn't stolen The Whispererof Peace.

What the police saw on the cameras later in the evening once the heist was over was that after Dark spoke and then jumped out of the window a strange man in a white top hat and mantle walked out of the shadows. He walked over to where the feathers were and crouched down to look at one as he picked it up, twirling it between his fingers and then vanished in a puff of smoke, together with all the feathers.

Dark however had stared down at the item that he'd 'stolen' once he got back to his place before he picked it up with a disturbed groan.  
"A rubber duck?" the phantom growled and turned the yellow toy in his hands, seeing that there was something written underneath it.  
_"See you next time  
~The Moonlight Magician *doodle*"_  
"That thief... How did he..." Dark stared at the duck and sighed; how would he find The Whispererof Peace now that this magician had taken it? He couldn't just search every building in the city.


	4. The Whisperer of Peace

A/N: Have a great day! Here's an update! And now I'm out to celebrate Walpurgis Night! Yes, I'm a heathen. XD

Warnings:  
Strange English, OOCness

Uploaded: 2013-04-30  
Chapter rating: K+  
Words: 3,000

* * *

**Chap. 4  
The Whisperer of Peace**

Kaito stared at The Whisperer of Peace as he sat beside his boyfriend with his back to the door that was standing ajar in case something happened to the patient, and it seemed like someone died every day at that place, or at least they tried to.  
"Peace-san," the thief whispered and stared into the blue stones that were its eyes, "please help Shinichi. He's the only thing I've got, and I love him so, so much." Kaito placed a gentle kiss on the dove's head and stared at it for a moment, hoping that something good was going to happen, but as nothing happened he sighed and placed it back in his lap before he bent forward, leaning his elbows on his knees and pulled out one of Dark's feathers from his sleeves. In a strong light he'd seen that the feather had a blue-purple-ish tinting instead of just plain black, which meant that it was the feather of a raven instead of a crow, but it was far too large to even come from a bird. What was even more significant was that one of the feathers had been torn from the very root and had a small amount of blood at the end, which meant that the wings weren't fake; Dark had some kind of magic, and he used it to grow wings.

For a long while he just sat there, unintentionally preening the feather, while allowing his mind to wander wherever it pleased. As the moon slowly travelled over the sky he came up with multiple shows for the small restaurant and he quietly structured the short future, deciding that he needed to find a second job, maybe he could get a cheap apartment somewhere and decorate it. If he got the second job he could buy his boyfriend some detective book; there ought to be some book about a great detective. Maybe he could even buy a book about a phantom thief, there ought to be some about Dark, or a Dark-like person, but he didn't want to read; he wanted to plan more heists to get Dark's attention.

Kaito yawned and stretched at bit before he decided to sleep on the floor between the detective and the window, knowing that he couldn't be seen from the doorway if he did.  
"I will wait for you to wake, Nichi," Kaito whispered and placed a lingering kiss on the detective's forehead, wishing with all his heart that his boyfriend would wake. He never thought that a wish could hurt that much, or that he could feel so lonely; last time he'd had Yukiko, Yuusaku and Chikage to speak with. Aoko had provided comfort, Hakuba had helped him stand, and the entire world had watched him and shown their support. Someone had even placed a hand on his shoulder on the train, telling him that his boyfriend would be fine, but now he had nothing. He was lost in a world in which he didn't belong and his only desire was that the detective would be with him. Kaito pulled away from his lover and a bit confused he looked around for the feather that he'd been holding, but it was nowhere to be found. One after one he took out the feathers and counted them all before he placed them back on their places. With an irritated scowl he looked around the room and found it nowhere, so he pulled out another one to caress for comfort and decided to ignore it completely. Staring at the feather he felt how his heart begun to beat harder; it was glowing in blue.

Gripping into it harder he narrowed his eyes; was it dangerous? Or was it exactly what Shinichi and Pandora needed? The relic obviously had stolen energy, and maybe Pandora could use the magic of the feather as energy. The feather dissolved into a weak blue light that travelled to the detective, and Kaito watched his boyfriend's hand move towards the energy, not much, but even so, he still took it as a confirmation and took out the next feather to hold it over the detective's hand, seeing how a finger twitched as he tried to move it upwards. Giving away the rest of the feathers he wondered how much the detective needed and if the other thief would help them, but he didn't feel like trusting Dark with something as important as Shinichi's life yet, not before he'd seen if the other was honourable.

* * *

A breath, or more like a confused thought went through the darkness. Complete darkness, nothing else but that darkness, but not cold, lonely, sorrow-filled; it was warm and calming, not dangerous. A red crystal stood before him, nothing else existed, just his single floating thought and the crystal. Curiously he went closer, seeing that it contained something, something that he recognised. The person inside the crystal was asleep and he felt how his own power began to slip away from him so he reached out to take whatever the crystal had to offer, but then stopped; something told him that the person inside needed it to stay safe. Smiling he took his outreached hand away and decided to go back to sleep, but as he turned around he recognised a power source. Carefully he tried to get to the power, but it was hard, and he was weak. Little by little he gained strength and suddenly felt a much stronger presence, but it was further away. Calculating his losses in case he failed he decided to try to get to it and reached out.

* * *

Kaito sighed as he was about to lay down to rest, freezing as he saw a trail of weak red light extend from the detective's hand towards the window. The magician watched in fascination how it reached behind the curtain and then retracted back to the detective again, now followed by a green trail. He carefully took the stolen artwork that he'd hidden behind the curtain and brought it closer to Shinichi, seeing how power was drawn from it to his beloved. Kaito twitched as the detective's hand grabbed into the dove and opened his eyes, staring at him.

* * *

Adárian. No, Pandora. Pandora was his name. The jewel realised this as he looked into the eyes of someone that looked like the protected one. Somehow that was good, and made him relax. The teenager with violet eyes was good, and Pandora was happy that he was there.  
"More," he forced out and realised that he had no way of dealing with the power if he was using the container, but the owner of the container, the protected one, was safe from it as long as he stayed protected.

Kaito stared in shock as Pandora closed his eyes again and then watched the green light die out as the last of it was absorbed, but then the heartbeat accelerated and sent an alarm to the nurses' station and he hid the item as the door was opened and Chiyo came in together with two of her colleagues, shooing him out.

A bit nervously he watched them through the small window in the door, seeing that the machines were stabilising and sighed in relief when they opened without doing anything.  
"What went wrong?" Kaito asked them when they came out.  
"He might've been dreaming, or having a nightmare. Normally, coma-patients don't dream, but since we have no idea what's wrong with him it's very likely that he woke up for a bit," Chiyo stated with a smile.  
"Um, he actually moved his hand," Kaito stated, hoping that they wouldn't restrict his visiting time and continued to answer questions about what had happened, but the thief was happy that he'd found a way to help his lover.

The thief smiled as he fell asleep on the floor beside his boyfriend, relaxing for the first time during the time he'd been in that world. His exhausted body had decided to take back a bit of the sleep he'd lost and he woke up for a moment during the following day, watching the setting sun and saw that someone had brought a small spare bed into the room, placed it behind the door and lifted him to it. Kaito smiled a bit at the fact that he hadn't even woken up and then turned around as he went back to sleep.

He yawned as he opened his eyes, seeing that the room was dark and that moonlight was shining in through the window. Even though his body was still tired he got up and washed himself in the sink in the restroom, smiling; tomorrow he would find out what criteria an item had to have in order for Dark to steal it, unless he only went around and took whatever he pleased, and if that was the case Kaito would just use The Whisperer of Peace as a reference, and go after objects that were similar to it.

* * *

Grinning, Kaito performed small simple tricks for the customers as he served the tables, hearing them speak about the fact that The Whisperer of Peace had shown up at the police station early in the morning with a note from someone that called himself 'gentleman thief', but they debated whether the signature said 1412 or KID. During the evening when the kitchen closed and most people were drinking and finishing their meals Kaito held a show, forcing himself to keep it very simple and low-profile; he couldn't afford to get any curious detectives on his trail when Shinichi was still so vulnerable.  
"That was great," Hotaka smiled and patted his shoulder as he locked the door to the restaurant, "you seem to be happier than before."  
"My brother woke up for a few seconds," Kaito smiled, still feeling odd about calling Shinichi his brother, but that couldn't really be helped. As the thief left the restaurant after having had a nice conversation with the owner he went to the park where he sat down on a bench and looked to the sky.

The hospital was closed so he couldn't go there, and even though he wanted to do some research on artwork he couldn't as the library and museums were closed. For a moment he sat there and felt himself calm down; it had been hard for him to not freak out about being moved to another world, but he had to make the best of the situation, for Shinichi, and Kaitou KID was something that had been a calming constant at home for a while, so now that he was beginning to use the same lines of thought he knew that everything would be okay. His peaceful smile morphed into a grin and he realised that he could go to the police station; they were open during the night and he could observe them so that he could disguise as them.

* * *

The next day, in disguise of an elderly man, Kaito went from museum to museum with a notepad in hand, writing up size, weight, history and meaning of artworks and paintings, since it seemed like Dark only went around stealing things randomly. The phantom thief appeared to be immortal too since every time he showed up he looked exactly the same, and Kaito had compared forty-year-old photographs with current ones and seen that he indeed looked the same, but there were only recorded history about him after something that was called the 'Cultural Revolution' that happened around 400 years ago where artworks that was said to contain magic were burnt and destroyed.

The thief stopped in front of a necklace, seeing the beautiful creation with a green emerald and smiled as he examined it with his eyes; it was perfect, since it was easy to get into the hospital and the item had been given to a woman by an artist to show her his undying love. Reading the information about the necklace he smiled; the artwork was said to bring luck to whoever wore it. He continued to a large armour with the emblem of a golden gryphon on the chest, reading that it was an artwork that had survived the Cultural Revolution and didn't notice how the eyes of the helmet glowed for a bit as he wrote down the information.

A redheaded boy on a fieldtrip with his class spun around and stared on the armour.  
_'It's awakening,'_ the voice inside his head stated and then sent a glance to the old man in front of it, _'__Daisuke, __prepare yourself!'_ The teenager with red hair took out a small black notepad and then hid in the doorway to a dark 'employers only'-room, waiting for the right moment, not wanting to change unless he absolutely had to. Daisuke watched how the old man walked away and the armour seemed to turn its head to follow him before it fell back into a slumber.  
'Dark, what's going on?' the boy wondered quietly in his head.  
_'I don't know... It's like the armour only woke up for a moment, but now it's fast asleep,'_ the phantom thief that lived inside the teenager's head stated thoughtfully, _'I've never seen anything do that, we should talk to grandpa as soon as possible.'_

Daisuke, the fifteen-year-old redhead, made his way to the armour and felt how it was falling into even deeper slumber.  
'I was certain that it would attack that man...' the teenager mused in his head, hearing a confirmation from his second half.  
_'Check around to see if there's something new in here that's bothering it,'_ Dark commanded concerned; he didn't like the feeling of whatever it was that had awakened it. It wasn't a malevolent command, it was more like something had puffed on it a bit of curiosity, or accidently brushed against it, and if there was an object that did that it would cause a whole lot of problems for him.  
'Then I'll have to sneak away from the others,' Daisuke thought and heard the phantom thief sigh.  
_'Congratulations, you have succeeded,'_ the voice snorted inside his head and made the teenager look around, seeing that his class was nowhere to be seen.  
"Oh?" he exclaimed and frowned a bit as he began walking his own way, passing the old man that had previously been in danger.

* * *

Kaito grinned as he sat in inspector Saehara's chair with his legs crossed by the ankles on top of the edge of the desk so that his shoes wouldn't dirty it, not that they were actually dirty, but he was a gentleman and didn't want to appear like a filthy dog. He yawned as he waited and did a few card tricks, checking the clock on the wall from time to time.

A few minutes later the inspector he'd been waiting for opened the door and froze as he saw that the new thief was sitting there in his chair, looking bored, but as the man frowned the thief's mouth slowly formed into a huge grin, and there was something very unnerving about it, something that made him want to run in the opposite direction; was this thief completely insane? What was he doing in a police station? In _his_ chair none the less?  
"Good evening, Keibu," Kaito greeted and placed his note on the desk, seeing how the inspector's eyes followed his every move.

"1412, you're under arrest," Saehara stated as he narrowed his eyes at the thief, seeing the apparently young man get up with a knowing smirk plastered over his face.  
"You have to catch me first," 1412 chuckled, clearly amused at the thought of him even trying, and that peeved Saehara, but he knew that there was no other way out of the room except past him, unless the thief was willing to jump from the window on the sixth floor. "What kind of name is 1412 anyway?" he asked with a snort, trying to get the other to lose his cool and come closer to him; he didn't want to run around the desk like an idiot, "it sounds stupid."  
"If you don't like it you can call me KID or Moonlight Magician," the thief shrugged, indifferent to the small pike.  
"KID? You actually named yourself KID? And what's up with the clothes?" the man questioned as he blocked the door, knowing that the night workers were in the break room only a few doors down; he could even hear them joking as they drank a cup of coffee.  
"Now if you don't mind I have to leave. See you soon," KID teased as he backed away to the window making the inspector take action and throw himself at him.

Saehara grabbed the thief's arm and pulled him back inside, only to see that it was a doll the size of a human, but before he even had time to recover from the shock it grew bigger and exploded. The night shift officers in the room further away froze at the sound and then ran out into the corridor only to see white smoke pouring out of the inspector's office.  
"Saehara-keibu?" one of them asked as their boss staggered out of his room, covered in blue dust, "what happened? I thought you were leaving..."  
"KID, his name is KID, not 1412," Saehara coughed a bit and stared into his now blue office with exhaustion, seeing that the only thing that wasn't blue was the note that had been left, "he seems to feel very strongly about this." The inspector's eyebrows shot into his hairline as he watched the blue colour disappear and leave his office clean; only the colour on his skin, clothes and hair was left.

* * *

Kaito turned for a while in his and Shinichi's big sleeping bag, once again struck by how lonely and empty it was without a detective in it, but that would soon change, even if he was forced to steal twice every night he would get his detective back, but in order to do that he needed rest and food; he wouldn't do any good if he was caught because he was weakened from hunger and lack of sleep.

* * *

A/N:

**Answer to guest review: D  
**Yea, I've been thinking about that a lot actually, but since I don't know any other system than the socialistic one I'm going to go with that one, and the hospital bill became surprisingly low! I thought that it would be way, _waaay_, higher than what I calculated it to. I mean you just have to get one pay in order to pay the entire bill off.

**Answer to guest review: Vacant Balcony**  
I'm sorry that I haven't responded! D: I always have time to update before I remember! So here's an answer, if you'll see this...  
Aw, you're so kind. And they are sweet because they are made of chocolate, no, but I seriously don't know why they are! XD

Gasp! No the horror! Dark/KID is never going to happen! Or not in this fic. anyway.


	5. On a Foundation of Lies

A/N: Other stories are poking at my brain, saying;  
TEP: "Write me!"  
Confused Identities: "No, me!"  
EDC: "They'll love me!"  
Runner 14: "But you've already written on me, write more!"  
Twisted Path: "Write on me now!"  
Ideas without names: "I wanna be written!"  
In the Footsteps of Others: "You're stuck on me! You have to get unstuck!"  
Me: "Please! One at the time!"  
Last Time in Moonlight: "I feel left out..."  
Halfblood: *suggestively* "Hey, I've got two chapters, why not publish one?"  
Me: "No, I already have FoO and TP that I'm writing on!"  
Secret Wishes: "Make a new OneShot collection with an M-rating and publish me!"  
Intruder Alert: "I agree with SW!"  
Me: "You're not even done!"

Warnings:  
Strange English, OOCness

Uploaded: 2013-05-16  
Chapter rating: K+  
Words: 3,400

* * *

**Chap. 5  
On a Foundation of Lies**

Dark didn't know what irked him most about the new thief; the fact that he smiled all the time or that he was dressed in the most brainless costume he'd ever seen; who used white when they went stealing? Not even Dark himself was stupid enough to do that! And why had he that impractical mantle, and why did he still seem to move quite comfortably in it?

Even though the strangeness of the other thief urged him to find out more information about him, the one thing he wondered most was what he'd done to The Whisperer of Peace. Dark had gone after that artwork because it was waking up and causing trouble with its magic; he needed to seal it away, but once the other thief had returned it, Dark had gone after it again without getting interrupted by the white-clad one, stealing it even though he could feel that it had no magic at all. What had KID done to it? Was he going to use the magic for his own goals? But the question that worried Dark the most was; was the thief a Hikari or was he working for them?

The phantom thief, now without his wings, grew annoyed as he ran through the corridor where officers dangled from the ceiling and felt how thoughts of using real magic against the thief was beginning to feel _very_ appealing, but using active magic would hurt his host, Daisuke, and force him to break his own principles of never using violent magic against a human being, no matter how annoying they were, however, he wouldn't be opposed to preparing a magic-inbound feather for the next time so that he could put him to sleep.

The white-clad thief jumped up to the middle railing of the stairs, holding into the necklace he'd vouched to steal. The magician's grin grew more amused before he vanished in a puff of smoke, making Dark growl.  
"Wiz," the purple-haired man called out as he got to the stairs and seemingly grew wings, watching how his challenger was travelling upwards in the hole between the stairs. With a few hard beats he was spiralling upwards, annoyed by the fact that the space between the stairs was too narrow for him to travel through while flying; KID had been lucky that he'd chosen those stairs because if he could've flown straight Dark would've caught up in no time.

Bursting through the door he saw that KID was standing by the far end of the roof, enlightened by the gigantic floodlights from below, and held the necklace towards the moon.  
"What are you doing?" Dark smiled a bit as he made sure to be in between the thief and the door while he walked out to the roof and saw how the thief lowered his arm with his face in shadows caused by the lights came from behind him.  
"Just remembering the past. Old habits die hard, I guess," KID grinned as he stood on the ledge of the roof, clearly used to heights.  
"You had questions..." the young man reminded the white thief.  
"And now, so do you," KID's grin changed into a confident smirk.  
"Of course, what did you do with the power from The Whisperer of Peace?" Dark questioned and folded his wings to his back as he gave the thief an annoyed look.  
"I simply... Stored it in a different form," KID answered with a tilt of his head, "now my turn; what are you? A wizard? Warlock? Witch? Sorcerer? Because those wings are not like my magic." The corners of Dark's mouth twitched in a smile; the thief was not related to the Hikaris if he didn't know that, but he could still be working for them.

"I can't possibly explain what I am to someone that hasn't even got that basic knowledge," the young man stated, trying to see if the other would get irritated by his refusal to answer, but KID didn't show anything other than the same smile.  
"A lot of things have happened in my life, a life that must seem _so_ _short_ to someone as old as you," KID chuckled as he started to shuffle a deck of cards, "try me, _oh, immortal one_." Dark's eyes narrowed as he got annoyed by the obvious taunt in the voice as KID said the last words, letting the winded thief know that the magician was well aware that it was always the same Dark that went stealing.  
"No, not before you've told me what you did with the magic."  
"A stalemate..." KID sighed as he threw the cards into the air and made them transform into blue burning butterflies that soared through the air around him.  
_'Woa, so beautiful!'_ Daisuke's voice gasped in awe in Dark's head.  
'Not the time Daisuke,' the man thought with a sigh, trying to ignore the scene, 'do _not_ admire the enemy when he's doing it do distract you to get an opening to attack.'  
_'It's really beautiful! Why is he a thief? He should be on stage to amaze his crowd,' _the teenager's words got the thief's mind whirling with questions without answers.

Kaito mentally frowned and studied Dark, seeing the same kind of expression as when Shinichi spoke with Pandora; it was very faint, but spending enough time with Shinichi had taught him to see when the detective was listening and when he was not. He opened his mouth, but before he could ask the thief about it officers poured out into the rooftop, pointing their guns at the two thieves.

"KID! Dark! You are both under arrest! Put your hands up!" Saehara called out, making Dark raise his hands with a deadpanned expression as he turned his back to the other thief and backed away from the police; there were no restraints that they had that could hold him. KID hummed and tilted his head as he let his grin return, making some of the officers frown and look at him with a suspicious expression.  
"KID, get off that ledge!" Saehara barked and saw the thief raise an eyebrow.  
"Since you feel so strongly about it, I guess I have no other choice," KID grinned wildly and shifted backwards, making every officer on the roof gasp in shock. The white-clad thief took a step off the building, falling with the same smile on his lips and made Dark's eyes widen as he spun around to see him disappear over the edge. With a low growl the purple-haired phantom thief ran the few meters to the edge and threw himself over it as he dove for the thief, intent on beating him to a pulp when he was done saving his stupid life; he should probably have him locked up somewhere, there was obviously something mentally wrong with him.

"You idiot!" Dark snarled as he gripped into the thief's waist, feeling that he was rather light for this size. Turning him around the seemingly young man faced a head with count down, seeing it change from four to three. He threw the doll down and beat his wings to get away from whatever it was, but soon after he was covered in smoke from the explosion, swerving to his right in case the thief was aiming something at him. Bursting out of the smoke he spun around in the air, looking everywhere for the magician, but the only thing he saw was an open window at the highest floor.  
_'He's really good,'_ the voice of his host stated inside Dark's head as he flew up to the window, knowing that he'd only missed it because he was too concentrated on saving the other's life. He struck the floor a bit hard as he landed inside and saw how a cloud fell from him, making him look down to his hands and arms. Pink; the other thief had turned him pink. After only a moment's hesitation Dark ran, trying to find the other, but little did he know that the officers on the roof were now one more than what they had been before.

* * *

Kaito had pulled out the inflatable doll as soon as the line of sight had been broken, covering himself from the crowd with the mantle and then pulled the mirrored clothes over himself as he dropped the doll. He shot the grappling hook to a small spire by the corner and swung around it, seeing that Dark jumped over the edge and tried to save the doll. He trembled a bit as his body protested against the strain he'd put on it during the last weeks and forced him to cling to the wall so that he wouldn't actually fall, but he quickly changed his clothes and then climbed up, seeing that the officers were looking over the edge.

"He's insane," Saehara stared down at the ground as he leaned over the ledge, "we need to capture him before he throws himself off a building thinking that he can fly when Dark isn't around."  
"I couldn't agree more, Saehara-keibu," an officer in front of the thief stated and walked up to his superior, "but next time you might want to specify your orders to him."  
"Yea, Tamotsu, I know. Well, he's gone now. They both are. Let's pack up, and show me the mess KID caused," the inspector ordered as he walked past his men.  
"Yes, sir," Kaito coursed with the others, feeling a bit degraded; he hadn't even caused a mess, it was just a few ropes and a single smoke trap, but then again, the officers had no idea how things were going to escalate once he found a way to get more supplies, but supplies required money, so for now he would have to use things sparsely and make everything the police got their hands on disappear into thin air.

* * *

He smiled as he closed the door at the hospital, knowing that he was actually breaking the rules by doing so, but he couldn't possibly care about it; the nurses didn't know what was wrong, but he did.  
"Please, Song of Luck," the thief whispered as he stood beside his comatose boyfriend, "bring my love to me." Kaito bit lightly into his tongue as he made the wish over and over in his head, distressed by the fact that nothing was happening. "Please," he moved the necklace closer, not wanting it to touch Shinichi, but still nothing happened, "pretty please?" He sighed as he sat down in the chair, feeling a bit crestfallen. He had known that not all objects would be magical, but the wish for it to be so had been so strong that he'd almost started to believe it himself.  
"So Dark knows what objects are magical, but I can't possibly wait for him to strike," the thief sighed and looked down on the necklace, knowing that the thief sometimes was out once or twice a week and could then disappear for weeks or months; there was no kind of structure to Dark, and that annoyed Kaito, because without a set rule to follow he would just have to strike randomly in hope of finding a magical object. "Lady Luck, grant me my wish, help me choose an object that will help Shinichi..."

* * *

Kaito had frowned unhappily at the newspaper's headline the next day; it seemed like people hated the fact that he had beaten Dark twice in a row, calling him an irresponsible maniac and a few other not-so-nice-things, but he'd decided that he wouldn't let it deter him. He was going to show them that he wasn't violent and that he was a gentleman. The next heist he'd found the perfect object to go after; a painting that Dark had targeted, but the granddaughter of the painter had begged the thief to not take it so he had just left it, and if Dark had targeted it Kaito was going after it.

* * *

The thief placed a heist note in the inspector's jacket and a bug on the collar of the shirt as he 'accidently' rounded a corner when he did, making both of them end up on the floor groaning from pain. With a quick excuse in a female voice Kaito picked up the dropped files and continued into an archive room where he placed the listening device in his ear and then left the station through the window.

He listened intently to the inspector as he made his examination of the gallery that held his target, waiting for the golden moment when the man discovered the heist note in his coat pocket. With a smile he finished looking over the place and left the building from the same window that he'd entered, pulled out a map and headed towards the next museum.

After sneaking inside he walked around and accidently overheard a phone call through the small crack in an opened door, and from what he heard had to be an employee to his boss.  
"You have to fire him!" the man hissed irritated, and judging by his clothes he was a cleaner, "why? I've told you why! He's always showing up drunk, and falls asleep in a corner, forcing me to do his tasks, and you're not paying me for that, so either you double my pay or I'm not working a day more... I know that it's against regulations to work 200%! That's why I'm telling you to fire him and hire someone else! I've been dealing with this shit for three months already! He's received God knows how many warnings. Can't I get a single decent person to work with? I refuse to clean up after him anymore. If I wanted to dry someone's ass I'd work with babies or elderly people! ... Yea yea yea, you know what, bullshit. And I don't care if you went to the same class as him in high school. You either deal with this until tomorrow or I will quit!" The man hung up and seemed like he wanted to crush his phone, but instead he took a few deep breaths.

Kaito smiled and left the museum; how hard could it be to work as a cleaner, really? All he would have to do was recognise what mixture of fluid was best to clean with and on what surface. He quickly made his way to a library and wrote down a cover letter and created a completely made up résumé and a last employer that could vouch for him. After a bit of tinkering with his mobile he made it able to accept calls from a telephone booth close to his sleeping bag by drawing a line from it, so as soon as he'd snuck in and placed the letter containing his information in a pile of newly delivered mail he sat down to wait in the park, annoyed by the fact that the inspector hadn't found the heist note in his pocket yet, but as he made himself a small lunch he heard a shocked gasp of his name.

"_KID?_" the inspector asked, unaware that the thief was listening in on the conversation.  
_"What about him, Keibu?"_ a second voice asked, much weaker as he was further away from the listening device.  
_"That damn thief has sent out another notice,"_ Saehara sighed and ate a bit of his lunch.  
_"Doesn't he have any cooling-down period? He stole only three days ago, and two days before that! Not even Dark goes out as often as he does."_  
_"I'm aware, Yutaka, but it's better for us,"_ the inspector reasoned with a smile in his tone, _"he's more prone to making a mistake if he continues this way, and when we catch him we can get him the help he needs, if he hasn't ended up as a wet spot on the ground."_

The thief was taken back by the way the inspector spoke about him; he was so used to hearing Nakamori yelling angrily that he had just assumed that Saehara was exactly the same, but it sounded like the inspector was genuinely worried about his mental and physical wellbeing, but that might change after Saehara got to know him as well as Nakamori did.

"_Is it another weird riddle?"_ Yutaka wondered and groaned, making Kaito believe that the inspector had handed him the note, _"why does he do that?"_  
_"Probably because he finds it amusing,"_ Saehara answered and drank from his drink, _"he probably likes making them and then have us solve them. He's asking us to play a game, but we won't be playing this time. Whatever he's going after we're moving it. Do you understand anything of what he's written?"  
"No... Not really... He's going after something tomorrow? Or tonight?"  
"I'll hand it to Shoji-kun as soon as he gets back from lunch; at least __**he**__ seems to be excited over these heist notes. Who knew that he had a knack for solving riddles..."_

The thief grinned as he sat in the forest; Nakamori had tried to move things often, and this time would be just as easy, especially since the police and Dark were unaware of his ability to disguise and fly. Kaito stayed in the park the entire day and evening, hoping that the phone would call as he counted and rearranged the supplies that he had. Food, clothes, gadgets; he was beginning to run low on everything but the criminal resources, even though he'd used a few of Shinichi's shirts, and washed them in the ocean. Later that day, while the thief was wondering if he should find a house of a family that was away to wash his clothes, his phone buzzed and he cleared his throat as he recognised the number on the display.

"Yes, this is Maeda Akira," Kaito answered in a much deeper voice.  
"Hello, Maeda-san, I'm Kimura Manabu, I'm calling about one of your previous workers, Kuroba Kaito, he left you as a reference," the manager of the museum informed in a formal voice, making the thief grin; he'd almost given up hope that the man would call.  
"Oh? Kaito-kun? Is he already searching for a job?" he asked in a surprised voice.  
"Eh? Yes, shouldn't he?" Kimura wondered.  
"Oh, you see, it was such a tragic accident. Poor boy, both of his parents died in a car crash last year, and he left the city with his brother after he quit. To travel the world to find a new home, he said. I guess he finally found one, I'm happy for him. Where are you calling from? If you don't mind me asking," the thief wondered with a grin, making sure to keep his voice solemn.  
"Tokyo."  
"Aah, I've heard that it's a beautiful city. I actually recommended Tokyo to him, I thought that it would fit him perfectly; the sea so close, but you're probably wondering what he's like to work with..." Kaito made it seem like his last employer was a bit talkative.  
"Yes, how is he as an employee?"  
"The best. Very pleasant to deal with, and he does his job well. A good co-worker, now, we're just a small company so I get to know every one of my employees. I really wish for him back, but last time we spoke it seemed as if he couldn't put a foot here without falling into mourning. If you chooses him you'll get one great person to deal with, was there anything more? I'm kind of swamped in paperwork; one of my new employees decided to call in and quit without any notice."  
"Ah, no, that would be everything I need to know. Thank you for taking the time."  
"Very well, have a good evening," Kaito smiled as he hung up and then carefully removed the small wire, effectively cutting the number to Maeda. With a fishing line he tied a small, parabolic device to his phone that would allow Kuroba Kaito to be able to pick up on a different number and glared at the battery in the mobile. He'd turned it off after he'd realised that it wasn't the same world as he was from, but it was not far from dying; he'd have to find a way to recharge it. Not long after the thief had fixed the mobile it started ringing and he picked up.

"Kuroba Kaito speaking," the thief greeted happily and smiled as he heard the manager introduce himself. He answered questions and then was told to come in for an interview the next day, laughing at the 'coincidence' that he'd posted his letter so that it had arrived when Kimura needed it the most.


	6. Of Thieves and Art

A/N: A funny thing is happening in the neighbouring town! XD SSAB (a steel company) has been the largest sponsor to the local hockey team, but now that SSAB has withdrawn the funds for the team the newly built server facility (Facebook) will take their place. Being the largest sponsor means that they gets to decide what the team will be named and they have already angered the fans by suggesting Facebook Hockey (SSAB let them keep their old name). And I can't stop laughing!

Warnings:  
Strange English, OOCness

Uploaded: 2013-05-30  
Chapter rating: K+  
Words: 3,900

* * *

**Chap. 6  
Of Thieves and Art**

The very next day, Kaito in disguise of the old curator at the gallery seemingly placed the small painting inside the secured, metal box that was standing on a table while he was supervised by the inspector, who was mostly trying to comfort the worrying granddaughter. With a small smile he closed the locks and took a step away from the box.  
"There, now no one but you, Sarehara-keibu, can open it and get to the painting," the thief smiled, knowing that no one would open the locks for the following day and notice that the painting wasn't there.  
"Thank you," the man said and nodded to one of the six civilian-dressed police officers that were there to escort the painting, and Kaito smiled as he recognised the edge of a latex mask on the officer's neck; apparently Dark could disguise, even though it wasn't as good as the magician, but how good was he at changing his voice?  
"Sarehara-keibu," Kaito began again in the old man's voice as he walked up to him, "I heard on the news that Dark had announced that he would protect the painting. Do you think that he'll show up here too?"  
"Probably," the inspector stated as he watched the painting being placed in a fake guitar-case and then turned his gaze to the elderly man with a long white beard, thin hair and thick glasses that made his eyes blurry, "have you set the fake in place?"  
"Yes, of course, I did that during the night, after you called me," Kaito smiled and watched how a white painting with a KID-caricature was carried away by a disguised Dark, "and he has to be really good in order to see that it's a forgery."  
"Great, thank you. You can return to your normal duties while we're getting out of here, and don't tell anybody about the switch." The thief chuckled a bit at Saehara's words.  
"I might be old, but I'm not a fool, not yet anyway," Kaito hummed a bit as he smiled to the police officers' backs and then waited until the door closed. With a grin he turned around and took out a second box from underneath the table where the real painting rested securely. He waited for a few minutes, checking so that the transmitter on the fake painting didn't stop moving or began to return before he made his way out the window and disappeared.

* * *

As Kaito was about to enter his boyfriend's room through the window he froze; the room was empty, even the machines were gone, and it only held a made bed and a few chairs. He leaned back and counted the windows to his right and below him; still the same, so Shinichi had been moved, because Kaito couldn't bear the thought of even thinking that his lover was dead. With quick movements he jumped into a tree and tied the metal box to the branches before he jumped down and walked into the hospital. Just as he'd predicted a nurse came up to him when he walked over to Shinichi's room.  
"Kuroba-sama has been moved since he's stable. I can take you to him," the young man stated and Kaito nodded. Getting to Shinichi's room, the thief was happy that it had a closable door with no glass pane in it.  
"Thank you," Kaito smiled as the man left and closed the door, seeing that his lover had a few different drips connected to him and a single machine that oversaw his heartbeat. He went up to the window and looked around the outside, happy that he was still on the side with the trees. Quickly he went outside and jumped from tree to tree until he got to the metal box and then made his way back. Kaito locked the door to the hallway and then sat down the box on a small table with wheels, designed so that it would hold food for the patient.

"Pandora," he whispered as he walked over to the bed with the table and sat down, "I brought a gift for you. I hope you'll like it." Kaito opened the locks and took out the painting. "Dark went after this once, so I'm guessing that it has magic, but I sure hope that he didn't take it all." For a small while he sat there without anything happening, but then the same kind of red trail left the detective's hand and neared the painting. The thief gasped as a blue, see-through shield formed like a globe around it, and pushed Pandora back even though it ignored his gloved hands that held into the frame. With interest he watched how the red trail retreated a few seconds, seemingly studying the protective magic before it touched the barrier again. The blue magic grew into a darker purple around the red and then seemed to shatter before it was absorbed into the trail and transported into the detective. The painting in Kaito's hands started to glow and grew warm, and as the thief took a look on it he saw that the picture of an angel on a cloud had been replaced with moving, burning flames, as if he was staring into a real fire. The heat from the blaze inside the frame intensified and Kaito gasped as a black-scaled hand shot out from inside, trying to grab him with large claws. A red shield formed around the painting and the black arm withdrew.

"Hate," the whisper made Kaito jolt his head to the detective, seeing red eyes meet his own, "it was made with hate."  
"The painting?" the thief asked as he threw a glance to the serene angel that had returned into the picture and saw how the jewel nodded weakly, "but it looks so peaceful. Is it dangerous?"  
"Not to me, I'll take the power, but not as fast, because that thing that lives inside only longs for death and destruction. We spoke, or it spoke, asking me to release it and work with it. Together we would soak the ground with red, it said. It would kill us both without hesitation if I were to release it," Pandora mumbled and Kaito saw how a pulse of power started to be drawn from the artwork.  
"It's good that you can use it... It's going to die when you take the power, isn't it?" the magician stated, seeing the jewel nod, and then continued, "how's Shinichi?"  
"Shinichi?" the red-eyed teenager asked quizzically.  
"Yea, Shinichi, he should be there with you," Kaito frowned at Pandora.  
"Oh? You mean the protected one?"  
"You have no memories, have you?"  
"How did you know?"  
"Shinichi told me that you lost your memories when you revived him," Kaito explained and leaned forward a bit, keeping an eye on the painting in his hands, "where's Shinichi? What do you mean that he's protected?"  
"He's sleeping in a crystal, he's safe," the jewel explained while continuing to draw energy from the painting.  
"Okay. Now listen, Pandora, there was an artwork that drew power from you and transported us here. Your eyes glows red when you're in control of Shinichi's body so don't talk to anyone else but me; I don't know what people would do to you if they found you, but I don't want to lose either of you."  
"Okay," Pandora whispered, deciding to trust the young man that was sitting in front of him since he was looking at him with such earnest concern.  
"Good. In this world Shinichi and I are brothers, twins. His name is Kuroba Shinichi and mine is Kuroba Kaito. We're both twenty. Our Father is Kuroba Toichi and our mother is Kuroba Yukiko. They died in a car accident a year and two months ago; the 2nd of March. Dad was a magician and mom owned a small shop. I want to be a magician too, and Shinichi wants to be a detective. Shinichi was shot trying to pursue his dreams two years ago. And that sums up the most important parts of our identities," Kaito quickly explained and smiled as Pandora nodded, "when will he become not-protected?"  
"If I were to take the shield's power I would also suck the life from him, killing him, I think... How do I know this?" the jewel frowned, unaware that he made the thief smile and then took his boyfriend's hand.  
"Don't worry about it. Your memories will return as you grow stronger, and I will bring things that can be magical. I'll help you heal, so don't worry," the thief caressed the hand as he bent forward and gave the jewel's cheek a gentle kiss, seeing how a small blush made its way to Pandora's face, and made Kaito smile happily; at least he still reacted the way he used to even if he couldn't remember everything they had done together.  
"I trust you," the jewel smiled a bit and closed his eyes. Kaito placed two fingers against his boyfriend's throat, feeling the pulse quicken and heard the machine react as he sent a glance to the painting, watching as the power was continued to be drawn. The red shield came back and then dissolved as the power was taken into the detective and Kaito sighed as he carefully placed the art in its box; it was time to bring it to the police station.

* * *

Four hours before the heist was even about to start the thief walked into the police station as an officer, carrying the metal box underneath his arm covered by a white sheet. Most policemen were out preparing for the heist or patrolling the streets so the building didn't hold that many people once he got past the receptions and filing rooms. He quickly entered Saehara's office and smiled as he opened the locks to the box and placed it underneath the desk together with a card before he opened the window and vanished like a gust of wind. It didn't take him long to find where the "real" painting had gone as it still had the tracker inside, but as he rappelled down the cliff towards a van he silently wondered if Dark had checked to see if the painting was there or not, and maybe had left; maybe it was a trap?

Kaito changed his clothes and disguised as the inspector, knowing that the man was pretending to set up traps at the gallery, and then made his way to the van. The thief tapped on the window and smiled as the officer opened it, allowing a small, timed bomb into the front seat.  
"Yutaka-kun, has anything happened?" he greeted the driver as he placed a radio jammer on the roof and walked to the back of the vehicle after the officer shook his head. He quickly picked the lock on the door and then entered it, seeing that Dark was still in his disguise, together with a few other officers.  
"Tamotsu-kun," Kaito said as he sat down in front of the thief in disguise and handed him a white gasmask, "you will need this." The officers blinked confused, but Dark seemed to immediately understand, and then placed it over his face as the entire van exploded in pink smoke. All of the officers fall asleep and the pink smoke slowly vanished, showing the inspector with a small, grey air tank in his mouth and a single officer with a white gasmask.

As Kaito took out the air tank from his mouth Dark followed suit and pulled off the gasmask, placing it beside himself.  
"Impressive disguise and voice," the officer stated and stared at the faux inspector in front of him, "but why didn't you just put me to sleep with the others?"  
"What purpose would that serve, my dear Kaitou?" the magician grinned, using his own voice again.  
"You'd get the painting without a fight."  
"I didn't come here for the painting. I came here for you," Kaito grabbed into his own suit and seemed to pull off his entire disguise. He covered himself with the jacket for a second as he placed the hat on his head and then threw all of the clothes in a pile beside him.  
"Really, so you're not going to steal the painting?" Dark asked suspiciously and glared as he too removed his disguise in a similar manner, but without caring about covering his face, and that was something that bothered Kaito; Dark had such well-known and easily recognised features, so how was he able to live his life without getting found? But then again; Dark had magic, so the face he was seeing might not be his own, but why would he wear a latex mask then and not just change his face if he could do that? Maybe he could only switch between two faces? One was his real persona and the other a thief; that would explain everything.

"I've already stolen it," Kaito confessed and couldn't help but to grin amused, "I've already left it at the police station, but I was thinking about going to the gallery to hold a show."  
"No, you haven't. I've had it in sight the entire time," Dark stated and pulled the box closer to him, unaware that the magician had seen that he had the end of a feather sticking out from the sleeve of his dark purple clothes; Kaito watched it out of the corner of his vision, aware that it must be special as the thief held his arms around the metal box and shielded the feather with his other hand, as if it was a gun. "Why are you a thief?" the young man continued while the white-clad thief sent a glance to his gasmask that was lying beside him, "you should be on a stage and not inside buildings during hours you aren't allowed to enter."  
"No," was all Kaito answered and shook his head without taking his eyes off the other thief's face.  
"No?"  
"No."  
"What are you talking about?" Dark asked annoyed.  
"No, that's not how things are going to work," Kaito smirked as he carefully placed his hands to rest on the middle of his thighs, not wanting to alert the other that he was prepared for a fight, "you've got answer to one of your questions, and you betrayed my trust by refusing to answer mine. Now I require two answers before you get to ask anything."

"I can't tell you what I am, ask something else," the purple-haired man glared a bit and Kaito hummed as he saw the same expression in the other's eyes as when Shinichi spoke with Pandora.  
"Pandora?" he asked; it was a different world, so technically there could be two of them, but so far he hadn't found himself.  
"Huh?" Dark looked honestly confused.  
"Are you Pandora?" Kaito asked again, "that's my first question."  
"I honestly don't know what you are talking about," the young man confessed and took a tighter grip around the box, but the magician saw that he spoke the truth.  
"That's too bad, I really wished to speak with someone reasonable," he sighed and realised that the description of the jewel didn't really match with his own experience, "or semi-reasonable, or perhaps a bit nutty. Yes, nutty..." The magician quietly ignored Dark's questioning eyes and thought over the next question.

"Are you going after objects that contain magic?" he then settled on and watched Dark's expression closely, but only saw the same kind of annoyance that he'd seen the previous heist.  
"Yes," the man stated and Kaito smiled, "who are you?"  
"Just like you wouldn't answer that, I won't either."  
"Deal, then why are you after magical objects?" Dark continued and made the magician frown as he realised that he didn't want to answer it.  
"I need them to help someone who's in trouble because of me," Kaito quickly answered, "can you tell me, on a scale from 1 to 100, how strong that painting was before you sealed it?"  
"Good choice of question," Dark grumbled when he realised that the enquiry answered multiple questions that the magician might have and made the other show him a raised eyebrow.  
"Of course it is."  
"No, I can't say how strong it is, or was when I sealed it, or how strong it potentially could be, but you must not release it," the thief answered and Kaito saw how black-clad fingers neared the feather in the sleeve, "does the name Hikari mean anything to you?"  
"I've heard it somewhere, but I don't remember where," Kaito confessed and narrowed his eyes, remembering reading it somewhere, in a book or on the internet; he wasn't sure of which. "The objects you steal are never heard from again, so why do you steal if you don't sell them?"  
"As you've already figured out; I seal them, and then keep them, most of the time," Dark stated and took a light grip into the feather as he prepared himself to put the other to sleep, "are you working for anyone?"

Kaito opened his mouth to answer, but closed it again; technically he was working for Pandora, but it could also be seen as helping a friend.  
"Yes and no. I'd describe it as 'aiding' instead if 'working for'," the magician confessed, hoping to get the other interested so that he could steal the feather from him; it obviously was special in some way, "who is Hikari?" Dark didn't seem happy with the question and Kaito wondered if he was about to stop the game.

"Someone who, unlike me, won't hesitate to use magic to kill you," the young man with purple hair clenched his teeth and narrowed his eyes while Kaito made a mental note to check up on Hikari, "who are you aiding?"  
"Pandora," the magician stated, confident that Dark wouldn't find Shinichi, and saw how confusion fluttered past the other's eyes.  
"But-, what? Why would you ask if I was Pandora if you're working for him?"  
"One question at the time," Kaito grinned, "how dangerous is the magic in the artworks?"  
"Very dangerous, and in the wrong hands it could destroy the planet," Dark stated.  
"Depending on the strength of them of course," Kaito interjected, "the necklace had nothing while the painting had a lot."  
"Exactly, you're beginning to understand. Now, what would it take for you to stop stealing and find your way back to a stage?" the purple-haired man asked as he relaxed a bit and Kaito saw that he had let go of the feather again.  
"Hmm... That's a hard one," the magician smiled a bit awkwardly, knowing that his stage was in his own world, "I can't answer it, because I honestly don't know."  
"Then I get a second question," Dark stated and Kaito shook his head.  
"Negative answers are still answers," he argued and leaned forward, "how can you tell what objects are magical?"  
"I feel it, but mostly they just cause a lot of disturbances in the city," the man stated as he agreed to the rules, "who is Pandora?"  
"Who?" Kaito laughed a bit; Pandora wasn't exactly a 'who', more of an 'it', "that would be hard to explain to someone that doesn't have that basic knowledge."  
"Touché," Dark muttered, hearing that the magician was gloating at the fact that he could use the same argument, "I'm old, so try me, oh, _mortal_ one."  
"The best way I can describe Pandora with is; someone who's currently in control of someone important to me. A person that I will not abandon," Kaito smiled as he realised that the jewel might be called something different in this world and saw how the other's eyes narrowed, "is the world inside red?"  
"What?"  
"Is the world inside red?" the magician saw complete confusion in the other's eyes.  
"What do you gain from asking obscure questions like that? I have no idea of what you're even talking about," Dark stated and Kaito observed his eyes, seeing how he quickly exchanged a few ideas with the voice in his head.  
"What I gain?" the white-clad thief hummed as he bent forward and stared at the other, allowing the young man to change question if he wanted to, but as Dark didn't change question he continued, "I gain knowledge of the fact that you have no idea of what I'm talking about. What would I have to do to make you tell me how to find magical artworks?"  
"I'll never tell you that. You're going to get hurt, or die if you continue."  
"I'm aware of the danger," Kaito stated seriously, "and you can't stop me. You might be 400 years or older, but that doesn't mean that you've ever encountered someone like me. You've got no idea how things are going to become. I'm not your normal policeman, I'm a magician; a master of deception, and I do hope that you have the ability to think on your feet, otherwise you're getting one free trip in the backseat of a police car. I'll give you one month to consider the offer of helping me to steal artworks that have the same strength as the painting. After that month I'll continue stealing the same way that made me famous."  
"Firstly; I'll never help you steal, and secondly; the only reason you're famous in Tokyo is because of me," Dark scowled and then twitched when Kaito smiled as he shot out and grabbed hard into the wrists.  
"Listen closely, Dark-san. I'm world famous, and yet you've never heard of me," the magician continued smiling as the other thief lost the feather he'd been hiding, "and that's a free clue to Pandora and why I have to steal, just because I've decided that you're a good person. And before I leave, say hello to the voice in your head from me." Dark's eyes widened shocked and he threw himself out of the van with the painting as the car exploded in smoke.

"Wiz," he called out and immediately took air, still holding the paining to his chest and looked around for the magician, but the other thief was gone. He flew to a small island not far out and cracked the code, but as he opened it he faced a KID-doodle and growled.  
_'How did he do that?!'_ Daisuke asked shocked in Dark's head while the phantom thief thought the same thing.  
"I authenticated it before it went into the metal box. I watched it go into the metal box. I took the metal box, and I never let go of it. There is no way that he could've done it!" Dark went through the memories and shook his head, trying to figure out how the painting had gone missing.  
_'We should ask him since we know that he'll be at the gallery,'_ the redhead mused while hearing Dark think about the mystery of the painting-switch.  
'But this means that he's gotten hold of the power, or that Pandora-guy has,' Dark fidgeted a bit nervously and tried grabbing the magic-bound feather in his sleeve, but only grasped empty air. He quickly patted his wrist and then took air, realising that the magician had stolen it, and felt worried; he had never actually met someone like the white-clad thief; that was completely true, not even his archenemy was as unpredictable as the magician, but then again, you could always trust someone evil to do evil things.

* * *

A/N: I promice, Shinichi will wake up in the next chapter! I really thought that he was going to be awake by now!

* * *

**Answer to guest review: D**  
Sorry! I always forget to answer the guest reviews and then have to hurry and answer on them before people read the new chapter, but you reviewed before I remembered XD  
Yea, I think I should write a bit on Last Time in Moonlight. No, I probably can't handle more stories and update them continuously.  
Thank you, I'm happy that you say that :D  
I'm from Sweden ;)


	7. At the Strike of Twelve

A/N: From time to time I do this... I wrote the wrong chapter and messed up the timeline, so I had to rewrite it and make it right. ;)

Warnings:  
Strange English, OOCness,

Uploaded: 2013-06-15  
Chapter rating: T  
Words: 3,100

* * *

**Chap. 7  
At the Strike of Twelve**

Pandora watched the magic flow into the books in the library that had formed as he tamed it and made it his own. With interest he'd been seeing letters form on pages that had once been blank; he was unable to read it, and wondered if his host could. The last of the magic disappeared into the walls and made the jewel smile; it was something unbelievably calming and joyful to deal with the power, as if it was something he'd done a lot in his past. The sound of a clear tone echoed through the silence, making him twitch and look around in terror before his eyes landed on the crystal that hung in the middle of the library. With a gasp Pandora saw how the middle of the crystal began to glow and then separated into an upper and a lower half.  
"No!" he called out and wanted to stop the shield from opening as the parts began to spin, "no-no-no-no! Stop!" With a small wince he tried to remember how to stop it, but his memories were still blank. The upper and lower part spun faster around the sleeping teenager, until they disintegrated into a millions flakes of light and was pulled into the red world around them. "Was that me?" he whispered as Shinichi was lowered to the floor, still sleeping, "did I open it when I commanded the power into the books?" His host groaned and Pandora stood frozen, fearing that the other would die if he neared him. With a cough the host's eyes opened and stared at the jewel with surprise before his lips formed a happy smile.

"Pandora!" Shinichi called out and tried to get up, but the exhaustion of his body was transferred to his mental image, making him weak and only allowed him to sit up, "I thought I had lost you!" The jewel couldn't help but to smile as his host looked at him with such happiness; it was special, and Pandora could remember something faintly that told him that Shinichi was his last host, never again would he have to deal with a selfish host that only considered him a tool. His and Shinichi's deaths had been tied together, and as long as he didn't grow too powerful, Shinichi was going to be his last; they were going to live together, happily, and then it was over. Pandora remembered that he always felt weary, because his life had been long and painful; he had hurt so many, and been hurt in return, but his life hadn't only contained suffering, there had been peace and happiness in it too.

"Pandora?" Shinichi called out, worried that he was hallucinating, and saw how the jewel twitched and then give him his attention.  
"Yes? Sorry, I got wound up in my own thoughts. I just got a lot of power, so I just began remembering feelings about myself," Pandora stated and then walked up to his host, knowing that he'd commanded the crystal to release his host when he was safe, "how are you feeling?"  
"Weak," the detective confessed and worriedly studied his friend's eyes, waiting for a perverted and witty comment about the fact that he needed protection, "how little do you remember?"  
"I know that you mean a lot to me, and so does our brother," Pandora confessed as he helped his host up from the floor, missing the way Shinichi frowned as he was half-carried to the settee.

"Do you know his name?" the detective wondered as he sat down.  
"Kuroba Kaito," the jewel answered and sat down beside him.  
"And my name?" Shinichi wondered and did a double take on the answer.  
"Kuroba Shinichi."  
"Our age?" he continued.  
"Twenty," Pandora smiled and saw his host's puzzled look; they were nineteen, not twenty, or had he been asleep for an entire year?  
"Tell me what you know about us," the detective requested and frowned as Pandora told him what Kaito had told him; they were twins, their parents were dead, and Shinichi couldn't make heads or tails of it. It didn't make any sense, and as he questioned the jewel further he discovered that 'his brother' was the one that had told him all this. He could only come up with a few reasonable theories and the two most reasonable was that they were for some reason living under an alias, or he'd been in a coma ever since he died the first time and had just dreamed it all up, but he needed to speak with Kaito to get to the bottom of everything; it didn't help him to speak with a completely confused jewel without making Pandora feel sad for his memory loss. While waiting for the thief that Shinichi knew was going to show up sooner or later he began telling the jewel everything that he knew about him.

* * *

Dark had supervised the location and was sitting in the darkness on the slanted roof of the bell tower on top of the church next to the gallery, waiting for the white-clad magician to show up. His wings fluttered in irritation, interest and worry; he didn't know Pandora's goals, or how to deal with a magician that was using tricks, maybe he should use real magic against him. The phantom thief leaned forward and lay down on his stomach to look over the edge, smiling as he saw 'Go Kaitou Dark' signs in the crowds, and then ducked as a large, round floodlight passed by the church's bell. Looking back over the edge he studied both the police and the crowds; he knew that the magician was going to 'hold a show' and the thief obviously was an attention seeker, judging by how he dressed, so he would probably go up on the roof and use some kind of window to vanish, unless he got caught. While waiting for the time to become 23.45 Dark studied the large open space filled with people; it was a large square with a fountain in the middle, and around the fountain pillars of stone were standing as decoration. The art around the fountain was a replica of a completed Stonehenge that had been placed there a few years ago. Most of the people had come to see him in action, but he saw a few KID-supporters there too, even though they seemed to be fans of them both.

When the time came Dark saw in surprise that the Moonlight Magician appeared up on the edge of the roof of the gallery in a puff of white smoke, exactly when his watch showed 23.45.  
"Ladies and Gentlemen!" KID called out as he threw his arms out, "welcome to tonight's show!" Dark, on his rooftop, raised an eyebrow as he watched the arrogantly confident thief and took flight just as the sky above him exploded in colours, making him visible and ruined his element of surprise.

Turning his attention to Dark the magician watched how he landed a few metres away and threw a glance to the door as the police officers were trying to force it open.  
"Thief-san," he greeted the purple-haired thief and gave him a toothy grin, "I was sure that you'd show."  
"KID," the thief replied and folded his wings to his back, "I don't know how you intend to beat me, but I will stop you, even if I have to get serious."  
"Ooh, are you sulking about the fact that I stole the painting without you knowing how?" Kaito teased, giving an air like he was not caring about why it was so dangerous to continue dabbling with magic.  
"No, but you're playing with something more dangerous than fire."  
"Like hate?" he smirked, hoping to find out if Dark knew what the painting represented and what it had contained, "to be honest, I can't see how an angel represents hate."  
"I'm guessing that Pandora told you that," the man stated and narrowed his eyes, "just because one symbol means something happy for you, doesn't mean that it means something happy for someone else, but if you've released that beast I'm going to hold you personally responsible for everyone that gets killed or injured."  
"I've given you my ultimatum; if you're worried about the destruction of the planet, or anyone, or me, you can gain my trust and help, but I do not suggest that you try to stop me, because you will never succeed," Kaito's voice was happy and carefree, but his eyes told Dark that he would fight to the very end, "remember that depending on how honourable you turn out to be is the only factor I care about. If you want to keep this place safe, help me, but you won't be able to stop me."

"I can't help you unless I know Pandora's goals, or who the hostage is," Dark stated quietly, knowing that it could be dangerous, and swallowed as he weight pros and cons about helping; it would be safer, unless KID was really working for _him_, then it would probably be a trap.  
"Sadly, that is very complicated, since it involves magic," Kaito said lingering as he watched the other thief near him, "and I don't trust you with my precious person just yet. What if you just seal the magic and I lose the only thing I have left? The only thing I care about?"  
"I can't help."  
"Then we're enemies," the white-clad thief stated as he grabbed into the edge of his mantle and spun it around himself, making him seemingly fly into the air. Dark immediately beat his winds and gave chase, realising that there must be a contraption somewhere that was pulling the other up, a contraption that had been dispatched after the fireworks. The magician spun around in the air as he stopped and then fell head-first towards the ground. Fire enveloped him and then made the audience gasp as he exploded into a firework.  
"KID!" Dark yelled and looked around for the magician, knowing that he wasn't using real magic and therefore couldn't vanish without a trace.

"Right," the white-clad thief's voice came from everywhere and then focused on one point as a cloud of smoke appeared in the middle of the air above the crowds, "here." The smoke vanished and KID was shown to be standing on nothing. "Dark-san, don't try to stop me; you will not succeed. And that's a promise," the magician stated as the purple-haired man dove for him, seeing him vanish in another puff of smoke. For a few more times KID showed up on random places while Dark was trying to figure out how he did the teleportation trick. The Moonlight Magician appeared on the edge of the roof, but as Dark reached him and grabbed him he turned into confetti.  
"Give up?" a voice asked from behind him and made the winged man spin around, seeing the grinning magician, but as he grabbed for him again he was engulfed in a cloud of smoke. Dark heard something and stared at where the noise had sounded from, seeing a shadow move across the sky, and it made him smile; now he knew how the trick was made. KID was using the same contraption and after he'd dropped a smoke bomb, confetti or a flash bomb he pulled something dark over himself and used the contraption to swing around, probably landing on prepared lines between the buildings; lines he would have to watch out for.

Following the shadow with his eyes he saw how a cloud of smoke appeared on one of the stones of the replicated Stonehenge. With a few tired flaps he had taken air, but this time he didn't want to alert the thief or make him run again; Dark was tired, and he pretended that he was even more so. He landed gently on the other side and began walking around it, now knowing how the other would be forced to move when he fled, and then he would get caught. The sound of the church bell resonated through the air and KID twitched to stare at it.  
"Oh? It's already over?" his solemn voice echoed across the area and Dark watched how the thief's movements became slower by every chime, even the mantle that was being caressed by strong winds was slowly freezing in place. "It was fun as long as it lasted," the words didn't even seem to come from the other thief, as his mouth was moving much slower. At the twelfth chime KID was completely frozen in time with the mantle behind him. The edges of the thief glowed in blue and Dark watched how small blue light-pieces broke off from him and recognised the butterflies that he'd seen the first heist. He watched the surroundings for a fleeing shadow, but saw nothing while the crowds gaped in awe. The police's floodlights focused solely on the purple-haired thief and he heard that officers were making their way through the mass of people.  
_'That was amazing,'_ Daisuke stated in his head and made Dark come back to life from his shock.  
'Yes, it was,' the thief confirmed, 'I saw no shadow when he left, did you see anything?'  
_'No, I was too focused on his magic,'_ the thief's host confessed and made the seemingly young man sigh before he took air, feeling which direction his feather was currently heading. Flying across the sky he realised that the magician must be flying somehow, because the strength of his magic was growing weaker, showing that KID was quickly getting further away from him, but Dark's wings were tired as the wind he'd been battling during their fight had been strong, and now that he was getting closer to the sea it was getting worse.

* * *

Kaito smiled as he entered the hospital room from the window and held out the feather for Pandora to sense.  
"Pan-pan, I brought you a treat," he grinned as he walked up to the bed and placed the feather on his sleeping boyfriend's stomach as he sat down on the edge. A red trail touched the feather, but nothing happened.  
"The power is sealed within the feather," the detective's voice stated and made the thief look at him, seeing blue eyes look back.  
"Shinichi, you're awake!" he exclaimed happily and took his lover's hand, "what do you mean 'sealed'? Pandora has taken power from sealed objects and from feathers before."  
"This is different," Shinichi repeated what the jewel was telling him, "the painting you came with was sealed with, say a house door. Pandora only had to kick it open to break the lock, and hold it closed so that the hate couldn't get out. However, this feather is locked with a vault Pandora can't open."  
"What about the other feathers?" the thief wondered and saw how Shinichi got a distant look in his eyes before he answered.

"You opened them," the detective stated with a smile and made Kaito's eyes widen in surprise, "they didn't contain much, but in the beginning Pandora wasn't strong enough to open anything. You opened the feathers and gave him strength enough to reach out to The Whisperer of Peace, which in turn made him strong enough to kick the door in, but the power in the feathers are still locked inside a vault."  
"But I didn't do anything," he stated and took up the feather, "I just held it out and wished that you were going to wake up." With a frown the thief made the wish, but nothing happened. He glared at the bluish black shine and wished, as if he was forcing it to work.

"Pandora says that nothing's happening," Shinichi stated as he studied his thief; to his trained eye Kaito looked weak and exhausted compared to when they had left their home in Tokyo. The magician's body seemed to have taken a heavy toll from the last time he'd seen him. As Kaito sighed and gave up he caught Shinichi's sad eyes.  
"What's wrong, Nichi?" he asked worriedly and took the hand in his.  
"I'm sorry, Kai. You look like you've been through hell again, all because of me," Shinichi confessed, "it's all my fault. I always gets hurt, and you always have to take care of me. If it wasn't for me, you'd be happy."  
"Shinichi," Kaito said with a shake of his head and bent forward to give him a kiss on his cheek, "if it wasn't for you, I'd be sad and lonely, fighting the organisation by myself. Yes, you do make me worried, more worried than I'd ever thought that I could be, because you always forget that you're only human and get hurt. You can't save everybody, but you're destroying yourself trying to prove that wrong. I hope that you'll realise that soon, preferably before I have to identify you at the morgue, but this time it was entirely my fault. If I hadn't touched that relic you wouldn't have done it either."  
"I'm sorry," the detective felt tears fall from his eyes and saw how his lover smiled gently before brushing his lips against his, making him throw his arms around his neck and pull him into a fiercer kiss. Kaito pushed down and felt Shinichi meet his desperate kiss, as if they both wanted to confirm that they were actually there, together, and not alone. Pain oozed through the magician's body and made him gasp as he pulled away. The feather glowed in a dark purple colour and Kaito felt as if his arm was on fire.

"Pandora, take it," he forced out and saw how a red trail came out from Shinichi's outreached hand, draining as much magic as quickly as it could.  
"Get rid of it, now!" the detective called out after Pandora told him to and saw how the thief disappeared out the window. Only a few seconds later a nurse ran into the room, alerted by the detective's yell, but Kaito was already on the roof, gasping for air through the pain the feather was causing him and all he knew was that he needed to get it away from the hospital. The thief ran across the roof, gripping hard into the arm that was holding the feather. Almost black magic surged out of the feather, scorching the ground and made Kaito stop as his mind whirled with questions and worry; what would happen if the feather exploded? Would it be a crater? Flames? Ice? How long did he have? Would he survive?

He was unable to let go of it and he wondered if he could shoot it with a card, but he realised in his panic why Dark had been so insistent on him not going after magical objects; he had no clue of what he was doing, but he had trusted his own abilities and luck, clearly a mistake. His legs trembled as the burning pain spread throughout his body and he saw how white began to colour the stem of the feather.

* * *

A/N: I actually wrote another chapter for this story... BUT it's far into the future. Stupid me.

* * *

**Answer to guest review: D**  
Aw, review have to wait to later... But I'm happy that you like it!

**Answer to guest review: Vacant Balcony  
**But I still like them, and I'm gonna take care of them and call them Bob!


	8. Home is Where the Heart is

A/N: I've been told by a person in Japan that he lived off of other's garbage for a while, since they in Japan are so notorious and packs everything in small bags; plastic in one, paper in one, food in one, and they threw away things that were working perfectly fine. (He was a non-Japanese, but it's an odd thing to hear)

Warnings:  
Strange English, OOCness,

Uploaded: 2013-07-02  
Chapter rating: K+  
Words: 3,700

* * *

**Chap. 8  
Home is Where the Heart is  
**

Dark swore as he saw the magic of his own feather on a roof not far from him, but he wouldn't have enough time to get to it and take it before the magician died without using magic.  
'I'm sorry, Daisuke,' he thought to his host, knowing that it would hurt him.  
_'Don't worry about me,'_ the teenager answered, knowing that the other thief must be in pain as he was holding into the feather. Dark's wings glowed in a shady blue and with a single beat he had travelled more than half the way. With only two beats he was there and landed on the roof to run up to the magician, but before he reached the other the magic turned white, causing Dark's eyes to widen, feeling that it would now injure him if he was hit by any of the moving vines. He threw himself to the side, out of range of the magic and stared shocked as it curled around the white-clad thief, forming a rose bud before it was pulled into the feather.

Kaito was certain that he was going to die from the magic when it suddenly disappeared and he gasped for air as he wobbled a bit, but was able to keep upright, until his knees gave way despite his efforts and he hit the gravel-covered roof sitting while staring at the now white feather.  
"What are you?" Dark's voice asked from behind him, making Kaito look back, but as he opened his mouth to respond he crashed completely to the roof, feeling his body refuse to work. The other thief's black sneakers came into view of his eyes as he walked up to him and Kaito looked up at the other, seeing his curious and discontent expression.

"Wah?" he asked as if it was completely normal for him to lie on rooftops.  
"You're alive," Dark sat down with his legs crossed and studied the feather in the magician's hand, unable to sense it, despite being so close to it. Carefully he reached out and held a hand over it, feeling that the magic was unstable, flowing like a wild river instead of a calm pond; it seemed to almost crash into itself, only to avoid the collision in the last moment and continued it's wild dance inside the feather, but what baffled Dark the most was the fact that it wasn't his own magic anymore. "That feather contained a lot of power. In case someone else showed up," the purple-haired man informed and touched the magician's hand, hearing him wince at the action, "you got burnt when you 'tamed' it; something that is impossible for a human, so what are you? Your home can't be nearby since I can't feel it, but I should be able to feel your active magic…" The thief trailed off while Kaito felt how he regained the muscles on his face and was able to spit out a few rocks from the gravel that had made their way into his mouth when he fell.

"Now it all makes sense," the white-clad teenager mused and took back the other's attention, "you're more like Pandora than Akako. You just said that magic is impossible for a human, meaning that you can't be human yourself. And unlike Pandora you can actually change your entire appearance between two people: your host and you, which is why you don't care about protecting your identity while performing heists, and which is why Dark's appearance always is the same."  
"I really don't like you; you're too clever for your own good, but my question still remains; what are you?" the purple-haired man sighed a bit defeated and smiled a bit.  
"I'm human-,"  
"You can't be, not entirely, and you don't even carry anything magical on you," Dark interrupted and cautiously grabbed into the stem of the feather, feeling the magic prick his fingers as if it wanted to go back to its new owner; the magic was just as uncontrollable as the magician that had tamed it.  
"I'm human," the magician stated once again, and began to worry; had the relic changed something? "at least I think so. I don't remember being born, but I have two human parents, even though I'm not from around, but I have experience with magic that for some reason doesn't work on me. Akako's love spells for one, and most of her tries to control my mind."  
"That's not what I meant," Dark tilted his head and placed his hand on his chest, "I have two human parents too, but I'm not human. My home is chained and sealed with strong magic, in the hands of _him_, so I can't feel it. If I could I would sacrifice myself and drag that white devil back to the place we came from, and you have to be something different, not completely human."  
"You and your enemy are from the same place."  
"Yes, we're two sides of a coin. His name is Krad and he has white wings. He does not care for his host and uses magic relentlessly even though it hurts him. I have seen him retreat only when his hosts came inches to death."

Dark warily slipped off the white glove, seeing that the thief's skin had been coloured to a glistering black.  
"Are you in any pain?" he wondered and saw how KID blinked for a few times, feeling his own body.  
"Not really, should I?"  
"I have no idea," Dark muttered and took a closer look, seeing that thin, white lines were beginning to slowly overrun the black skin, "but there's definitely something off about you." The young man held the feather in front of himself, knowing that the magician could see it, "my magic is black, purple or blue, depending on the strength of it, and the only ones that have this kind of white magic are the Hikaris, so you're one of them and are the lucky second-born, that has been hidden from the world. From what I've heard the last Hikari's parents are dead, but I still wonder about that accident; I think that the white monster that he's battling every day might've murdered them with his own body. It's not very common among the Hikaris that the monster in their bloodline gets angry and kills them, since fewer descendants means fewer possible hosts for him."

"So Hikari is a host to a monster with white magic?" Kaito asked and felt how a pricking sensation came over his arms as he regained the feeling in them.  
"Yes, and if you're only working for him he will destroy you, unless he knows, no matter what you do for him, so if you are working for Krad you have to tell me, because I'm the only one who can battle him," Dark's voice was worried as he spoke and the magician could understand why; if someone malicious found a way to gain more strength they would use it to hurt others.

"I'm not working for Hikari," he stated with certainty and made the other sigh.  
"You can't know th-,"  
"Yes," Kaito interrupted, "I _can_ know that. There's a reason for me knowing that; a reason I'm not willing to tell you, but it's the same reason I'm famous all over the world without you having heard a single whisper about me.  
"Okay, then you should know Pandora's goals, and if Pandora is working for someone else, and how would you know that Pandora isn't lying to you?" Dark tried, but Kaito only gave him an annoyed stare.  
"I've known Pandora since a while back-,"  
"And yet he's holding someone hostage."  
"It's complicated, but I never used the word 'hostage'; you did. I just said that he has someone I care about," Kaito grinned as he moved his toes and then flew up from the ground, grabbing the feather and remembered that he'd felt pain every single time that he'd given feathers to Pandora, so now that the magic wasn't hurting him anymore Pandora ought to be able to take it.

In a puff of smoke he vanished and entered the hospital in the form of a nurse, but as he checked the medical chart of a long-time coma patient furthest away from the window Dark entered through the same window, making him squeak femininely, hoping that the other wasn't able to feel the magic from the feather now that it wasn't his own and since he wasn't able to feel any active magic from Kaito.

"Dark-san!" he gasped happily and saw how the thief's annoyed expression vanished as it was replaced by a conceited smile, unaware that the other thief's host was sighing at his antics.  
"Good evening, have you seen a person enter this room from this window recently?"  
"No, only you," the magician held the chart to his chest, hiding his non-existent bosom and placed the feather in the patient's bed, but when he saw that the thief was about to walk up to him Kaito met him halfway, hoping that the other wouldn't sense the magic.

"Dark-san, is there anything I can do for you?" he asked timidly.  
"No, you've been more than helpful," the man answered and leaned forward, giving Kaito a quick kiss on his cheek, gently as a butterfly before he pulled away.  
"Dark-san," Kaito forced himself to blush a bit as if he was happy with the kiss, even though he rather would've hit the other unconscious with the chart that he was holding. With a smirk Dark went out the window and Kaito saw how he flew around outside, sometimes landing on the edge of a windowsill and looked inside.  
"Idiot," he muttered annoyed and brushed his cheek on his sleeve, knowing that there would be a sorry thief the next heist; wings and glue never was a good combination, especially not the purple slime that had to be removed with alcohol. The protective fat on Dark's feathers would get destroyed if he wasn't able to remove it with magic.

* * *

Kaito walked into his boyfriend's room in disguise and saw that there were multiple people there taking Shinichi's pulse and made sure that he was okay. With a smile he saw that the detective sent him a happy glance and Kaito began to rearrange sheets in a cupboard while eavesdropping on the nurse that told his boyfriend that he could call them if he needed something. Kaito smiled politely at her as she left and then turned to his boyfriend with a grin once they were alone.  
"Hi, how are you?" he wondered as he sat down on the soft bed and caressed a few hairs out of the detective's face, feeling his heart pound happily in his chest; Shinichi waking up was a step in the right direction.  
"Confused, but happy. We're brothers?" Shinichi wondered and Kaito could hear all of the other questions that his tone encompassed.  
"Yea, let's just say that a lot of things have happened," the thief began as he pulled out the feather and explained everything that had occurred and irritated told him how Dark had dared to kiss him while Pandora absorbed the power.

* * *

Kaito happily greeted his 'brother' during the evening the next day and gave him a warm hug before turning to the nurse that had brought him there.  
"How is he? Healthy?"  
"We're still running tests on him," the woman in the doorway informed, "unfortunately we haven't discovered why he went into a coma, so we want too keep him here for a while."  
"Okay," Kaito nodded and began to lay up strategies for the near future; he needed to get a cheap apartment where they could stay, because he didn't want his recovering boyfriend and a weak Pandora sleeping on the ground. The food expenses would double, but they could make it work with the pay he got from the restaurant. He would get the pay check from the gallery the next week, and by his calculations for how many days he'd worked by then he'd receive an amount that would be enough for rent, as long as he didn't need to put in some kind of large safety deposit. And after that there would be the medical bill to pay; maybe they could just vanish without a trace.  
"Can you make an educated guess? A week or more?"

"One to two weeks. He's free to leave the hospital as long as he stays on the grounds. We want to supervise him in case he goes into a coma again," she informed and got a happy nod from the thief.  
"Thank you, it'll be good to see him up and about," he grinned and watched as she left.  
"I thought I'd see you sooner," Shinichi smiled as Kaito sat down and took his hand.  
"Hey, I have work you know," the magician smiled and tried to look a bit offended, "I just came from the museum, and there isn't really that much to do. It's too much work for one person, but too little for two, so I have time to research artworks during my breaks and I have found the common thing that most of the artworks that Dark steals have." The detective raised his eyebrows in interest and listened intently. "I had to dig a bit deeper into the artworks' history, but most of the works that he targets are from before the Cultural Revolution and are made by the Hikaris, who were artists, but that information is pretty useless now that you are awake, since we only have to go to a museum and let Pandora find something to munch on."

"True, but we'll manage. That's what we do…" Shinichi sighed deeply and smiled a bit relieved, forcing away the slight depression that he'd been having after wondering if he would ever see his parents or friends again.  
"To tell the truth, I thought that you would freak out a bit about being transported to another world," Kaito pouted at the fact that he'd been wrong.  
"You're looking at a person that has died, been revived with a magical jewel, turned to a child and back, and has a voice in their head. How much do you think that the world can surprise me?" Shinichi grinned amused and enjoyed that he could caress the other's hand with his thumb; at least he wasn't away from his beloved.  
"Now that you mention it…"

"But I've been thinking since yesterday," the detective continued, "I think it would be good if you went and distracted Dark as KID, since you said that he can feel active magic, but not all the time. Can he feel Pandora?"  
"I don't think so. If he could he'd probably have entered your room last night, since he was flying around outside for a while, but he might need a closer proximity to you. It might also be because we're from a different world since I can get burnt by his magic without dying. I think that it would be good if you and Pandora went around and found different artworks, researched them and then struck one location at the time while I distracted him in a different part of town. We can use the headset to communicate, and if he senses what you are doing I'll send you a warning so that you can get out. We also need to convince Dark to help us with the relic, because I can't find any references to it, and he knows things, but Pandora have to get stronger before that, and I'll mess with him and try to convince him to help until that time."  
"Sounds like a plan," Shinichi smiled with a nod and looked out to the setting sun, "how about a tour outside before you have to leave?"  
"Sure," Kaito smiled lovingly and helped his boyfriend up, realising how weak the detective had grown while not being able to move.

* * *

With a tired sigh Kaito sat down on the other side of a park bench and glanced to the old lady that was feeding some pigeons and turned his gaze to the sky. He had been looking around for apartments, and there were a lot cheap ones, for obvious reasons since most of them were in bad neighbourhoods, but he didn't want to expose his weak and a bit self-destructive boyfriend to those areas; it would just end up with history repeating itself and Shinichi getting hurt all over again, so he continued looking. He had found a few areas with good neighbourhoods and a good or decent rent, unfortunately the apartments were smaller than any place he'd ever seen before, and he'd seen some tiny apartments. One of the best that he'd discovered was one where they'd be lucky if they got enough room to put a bed in, but then they'd have to sit on the bed to cook or do anything, not to mention that their KID-stuff would be fully visible on the bed or underneath it.

"You look troubled, young man," the old lady chuckled and made Kaito look towards her, seeing her throw a few grains to the pigeons before her.  
"Yea, I'm looking for an apartment, so I'm thinking about the different options," the thief smiled and then felt a strange tinge from the elderly as she smiled towards the birds.  
"I've heard whispers about you," she continued with a small chuckle and made Kaito raise an eyebrow, suddenly very cautious of her and grew more and more uncertain as she continued, "yes, the strongest are talking about you, and they are saying that the white winged one is coming back, because of you. You appeared out of nowhere, waking many as you arrived, and then that magician, KID, showed up." The woman laughed heartedly as she turned her kind, green eyes towards the thief, seeing him stare at her with an unreadable expression, but she was beautiful; like the perfect grandmother with a flawless, yet wrinkled skin and short wavy, pearl-white hair. "I've never been one to believe in coincidences," the old lady smiled as she reached out a hand and made the magician pull away a bit from her, but still let her touch his cheek, "no, you're definitely not from around. You're so different from anything I've ever met before."

"I'm sorry, I don't know what you are talking about," Kaito tried and got up from the bench to get away from the woman that was making the hair on his neck rise.  
"Of course you don't," the old lady chuckled and continued to feed the pigeons as Kaito hesitated.  
"Say… Who are you?" he wondered as he stole a quick glance around, seeing that there were only a few others in the park, but he'd taken a late lunch so that was expected.  
"Viride De Cataracta," the old lady smiled, "it's a pleasure to meet you, stranger."  
"The same, Viride-san, but I have to go or I'll be late for work," Kaito backed away from her, hearing her say a goodbye and continued to feed the birds without giving him a second glance. With a quick pace he passed the large fountain and made his way out of the park, deciding to come back later to speak again when he had his gear in case she was Dark in disguise.

* * *

For a few days he walked past the park whenever he had the chance, but the old lady didn't show up. With a disappointed sigh he sat down on the same bench and looked to the sunny sky; another lunch without luck had gone by, but he had finally found a good-enough apartment. The building was a bit run-down and the place would be demolished the very next year so there were only a few, odd tenants left that hadn't cared to find a new place yet, but Kaito doubted that he and Shinichi would stay for an entire year; it wasn't a thought that he wanted to think, but it was still there, simmering just underneath the surface. What if they were stuck in that world and never would be able to get back?

He'd spoken with the kind, grey-haired, middle-age man that was in charge of the apartments, and had been told that he could do whatever he wanted to the place since it would be taken down anyway. It was a cheap and large place and the previous tenant had left a couch, a table and a few trinkets, so Kaito had only bought a bed since they had utensils in the backpacks. He'd flown over the city during the night, and seen old tables that were standing by the burnable garbage container; it was a surprise to him how much stuff in good condition people threw away. Knowing that no one would miss the tables he had taken them and created a fake wall with them and wallpaper in the apartment, where the KID-equipment now was hidden.

Kaito walked up to the fountain and sat down on the edge to look at the glistening water, thinking about the old lady while counting the pennies he could see at the bottom. Absentmindedly he let his eyes wander over the sunny park, filled with more people than he'd seen before in it, but he quickly discovered that it was a few classes from an elementary school that were having some kind of mini-game-competition on the lawn. He ate his lunch in the park and then left it, but as he threw a glance back he saw a small plaque beside the fountain. Reading the name of the marble piece his eyes widened and he couldn't help but to stare at the small statue of an old lady feeding pigeons at the base of the fountain.

"_Viride De Cataracta  
To honour Satou Aiko, dead at 64, who loved pigeons and took care of homeless children, fed them, gave them clothes and educated them, five of her students hand-carved the fountain of sacrifice for six years before it was placed in the park. The original inscription from 1631 read: 'You will be missed, dear Mother of All.'"_

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**Alternative** to the old lady that I almost went with:

"Yea, I'm looking for an apartment, so I'm thinking about the different options," the thief smiled and then felt a pang of recognition wash over him as the old lady looked at him with dark, purple-red eyes, "Akako?"  
"Oh?" the old lady laughed the same kind of creepy laugh as he'd heard lots of times in the classroom, removing any doubts in his mind that it wasn't her, "I haven't been called Akako for a _very_ long time. Do I know you?"  
"No, but I know you; Akako Koizumi, witch."  
"Not anymore, young man. It was so many years ago that you could call me a witch. I fell in love with a young man, you see, and I cried a tear," the old lady Akako smiled.  
"But you still have the knowledge," Kaito exclaimed excitedly and made the former witch raise her eyebrows, "you have to help me get home. I'm not from this world, and the Akako I know goes to my class. So can you please help me."  
"It will cost," the familiar sentence that Kaito had heard multiple times before left the witch's mouth and made him snort.  
"What do you want?"

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**Answer to guest review: ElizabethBathog**  
I'm happy that you like it, and I hope that I won't destroy the characters too much! XD

**Answer to guest review: mya**  
I don't know. I'm just having a hard time concentrating on what to write and how to formulate sentences ^^


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